Chapter XVI HELLENIC CITIES AND STATES OF THE WESTERN AND NORTHERN BLACK SEA REGION IN THE ERA OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN 29-27 the Romans made another attempt to strengthen their influence in the Western Black Sea region by sending a military expedition against the Bessians and other recalcitrant Thracians, instructing

Under the last king of the Spartokid dynasty, Perisades V, the pressure of the Scythians on the European part of the Bosporus was so strong that, not being able to resist the Scythians, the Bosporan ruling elite, led by Perisads, decided to seek help from the powerful Pontic king Mithridates VI, nicknamed Eupator (i.e., Eupator). e. "noble" or "noble"). He owned lands located south of the Black Sea. Mithridates sent a military expedition to the Crimea, led by the commander Diophantus, who defeated the Scythians there and, having arrived in the Bosporus, began negotiations with Perisad V to transfer power to Mithridates. But the negotiations were not destined to end, since in 107 BC. e. in the Bosporus, an uprising of slaves broke out, led by Savmak.

The rebels killed Perisad and proclaimed Savmak king, who even began to mint silver coins with the image of the head of Helios and with his own name. Diophantus, who managed to escape to Mithridates, returned to the Bosporus six months later at the head of a large land army and accompanied by a fleet. He brutally cracked down on the rebels and proclaimed the king of the Bosporus Mithridates Eupator, an ambitious commander whose main dream was victory over Rome. From that time on, the Bosporus kingdom became part of the Pontic state for many years.
Mithridates - the head of the Pontic kingdom - one of the brightest figures of antiquity. There were many legends about him during his lifetime. As an eleven-year-old boy, Mithridates received the royal diadem after the death of his father, but, fearing murderers sent by his rivals, he hid for seven years, wandering around the country, and returned to the throne hardened in life's adversities. The legend attributed to him a wide variety of qualities, portrayed him as a man of gigantic growth, who ran faster than a fallow deer, tamed wild horses, knew how to control sixteen horses harnessed to a chariot at once, and ran into wild animals. Mithridates was very cruel and suspicious, he was constantly afraid that he would be poisoned, and accustomed his body to various poisons. He was a good commander and politician, skillfully used for his own purposes the dissatisfaction of the Hellenic cities and various peoples of the East with the rapid growth of the Roman state.
The economic rise of Gorgippia, which emerged in the second half of the II century. BC e., continued during the period of subordination of the Bosporan kingdom to Mithridates of Pontus. In the first quarter of the 1st c. BC e. Gorgippia, among the main Bosporan cities (together with Panticapaeum and Phanagoria), received from Mithridates the right to mint coins. Gorgippian silver coins are known - didrachms with the head of a young Dionysus and with the name of the city in the center of an ivy wreath, drachmas - with the head of Artemis and a running deer, and trioboles - with the head of Dionysus and thyrsus. Gorgippia minted copper coins in smaller quantities: obols with the head of the Asia Minor god Men and standing Dionysus with a panther, tetrachalki with the head of Apollo and a tripod with thyrsus, and two more small denominations of copper coins with a star and a tripod and with a wing and a tripod. The fact that it was on a par with Panticapaeum and Phanagoria testifies to its increased economic well-being and a big role in the economic life of the Bosporus.
Mithridates tried to use the material wealth of the Bosporus to fight against Rome. According to Strabo, he received tribute from the Bosporus in the amount of 180,000 medimns of bread and 200 talents of silver, that is, 7200 tons of bread and 4094 kg of silver. Mithridates spent huge amounts of money on wars with Rome. But his struggle against Rome was unsuccessful. During the third and last war, which lasted 10 years and ended with the defeat of Mithridates, the ruler of the Bosporus was the son of Mithridates Mahar.
At a critical moment for Mithridates, Mahar betrayed his father, going over to the side of the Romans. Returning to the Bosporus through the Caucasian coast, Mithridates killed Mahar and took control of the Bosporus in his own hands. Mithridates entered into alliances with the leaders of many barbarian tribes neighboring the Bosporus. He even intermarried with some, betrothing his daughters to them. Preparing for a new war with Rome, Mithridates increased the exactions from the population. He began to recruit slaves into the army, which caused dissatisfaction with the trade and slave-owning elite of the Bosporan cities.
The discontent was increased by the tax collectors and the difficult economic situation of the trading cities due to the naval blockade carried out by the Roman fleet. All this led to an uprising of the Bosporans. Phanagoria was the first to revolt, followed by other cities. Fermentation began in the army of Mithridates. Seeing the plight of Mithridates, his second son, Farnak, went over to the side of the Romans.
Mithridates was in a hopeless situation. Fleeing from the rebellious soldiers, he took refuge in the Panticapaeum palace. This palace has not yet been found, but it was probably located on the acropolis - on the top of the mountain, which is called in memory of the Pontic king - Mithridates.
Not wanting to fall into the hands of enemies, Mithridates tried to poison himself, but the poison did not work, and at the last moment he begged one of the bodyguards to stab him with a sword. This was in 63 BC. e.

The death of Mithridates gave the Bosporus into the hands of the Romans. According to Strabo, now the Romans began to appoint the Bosporan kings. First, they appointed the son of Mithridates Farnak as king, who went over to their side, but Farnak was opposed by the noble Bosporan Asander. With the support of the local Bosporan aristocracy, he proclaimed himself king and defeated Pharnaces, who died of his wounds in 47 BC. e.

Soon Asander married his daughter Dynamia, the granddaughter of Mithridates. The new ruler carried out great work to strengthen the Bosporus. He even built a grandiose rampart with towers in the Crimea to protect against nomads. After the death of Asander in 17 AD, control passed to Dynamis, but against the will of the Bosporans, Rome appointed the Pontic king Polemon as king of the Bosporus. Only in the year 14 did the Bosporans cease resistance and recognize Polemon as king, whose wife was Dynamia. With the help of the Aspurgian tribe, who, according to Strabo, were Meotians and lived between Phanagoria and Gorgippia, Dynamia got rid of Polemon in 8 BC. e. and began to rule alone. She was a courageous woman who was supported by the Bosporan aristocracy, who did not want to submit to the Roman state. After her death in 3 AD. e. Aspurg, son of Asander, became king.
Gorgippia, which had become one of the most important cities of the state under Mithridates, continued to flourish. Its trade relations expanded, crafts and crafts developed, and public buildings were erected. On one of the stone blocks found in the courtyard of the Anapa hotel, the texts of two rescripts published by Aspurg in 15 AD have been preserved. e. In one of them, the king thanked the inhabitants of Gorgippia for remaining loyal to him while he was leaving for negotiations with the Roman emperor (apparently, other Bosporan cities, taking advantage of the absence of the king, rebelled against him). In the second rescript, Aspurgus reported that he exempted the Gorgippians from part of the taxes and duties on agricultural products: he allowed them not to pay the established tax in the amount of 1/11 of the harvest of wine, wheat and, possibly, barley, and part of the harvest of millet. Since, wanting to thank the Gorgippians, the king reduces taxes on agricultural products, we can assume that agriculture was the main occupation of the inhabitants. This also testifies to the predominance at the beginning of the 1st century. among the influential Gorgippian citizens of farmers and the great role among them of the owners of large agricultural estates, where grapes and grain crops were cultivated.
Gorgippia, like all other Bosporan cities, in the 1st c. p. e. no longer minted its own coins. In the Bosporus, now coins were issued only with the names and monograms of the Bosporan kings.
During the I and II centuries. n. e. the city is improving. At this time, fish salting baths and wineries appeared on its territory.
One of the wineries, discovered in Anapa in 1969, had two crushing platforms covered with a dense layer of lime, sand and crushed ceramics. Grapes were crushed with dogs, the squeezed juice entered two reservoirs - rectangular pits (cistern), the walls and bottom of which were also covered with opium. Traces of winemaking in Gorgippia during the period of a new economic heyday put it on a par with other cities of the Asian part of the Bosporus kingdom, for example, with Kepami and Phanagoria, in whose economy winemaking occupied an important place.
The Greeks of the Bosporan cities, as well as the tribes surrounding them, consumed a large amount of dry wine. True, some varieties were brought to Gorgippia from the Mediterranean and the Southern Black Sea region, but this was not enough. Therefore, near the Bosporan cities, farmers have long grown their own grapes. It is no coincidence that on the coins of Nymphaeum, one of the Bosporan cities, already in the 5th century. BC e. depicted a bunch of grapes. The earliest Bosporan wineries dating back to the 4th century BC were also found there. BC e. When squeezing grape juice, the Bosporans often used special mechanical presses. Judging by the wineries, this was also practiced in Gorgippia.
Along with winemaking, the inhabitants of Gorgippia in the 1st c. BC e. and in the 1st c. n. e. were also engaged in fishing. Pontic fish was highly valued by the Greeks and Romans. Apparently, fish dishes occupied a significant place in the diet of the inhabitants of various Greek city-states of the Northern Black Sea region. So, in Olbia and Chersonese, there were even special fish markets. Fish sauces were very popular. Salted fish was exported to the Mediterranean. Greek poet of the 4th century BC e. Archestratus wrote a special essay "Notes on the Bosporus salted fish." Strabo reports on the large size of sturgeons caught in the Kerch Strait, and on the export of salted fish from Lake Meotida (Sea of ​​Azov). Polybius wrote that salted fish, brought from the Pontic countries to Rome, was considered a luxury item there. He tells how the famous politician Cato was indignant because some of the Romans were buying "for thirty drachmas a barrel of Pontic salted fish ..."
The development of fishing in Gorgippia is evidenced by the remains of two fish-salting baths found there in 1960, located on the very shore of the sea.
The development of crafts in Gorgippia was accompanied at the same time by the flourishing of crafts. In the 1st century BC e. and in the first centuries of our era, Gorgippia retained the importance of a craft and trade center. The products of its potters, coroplasts and other artisans were widely distributed throughout the surrounding countryside and exported to remote areas of the Kuban region.
In the 1st century n. e. a new economic upsurge of the Bosporan kingdom began. Perhaps it was associated with new forms of agricultural organization. In Gorgippia, inscriptions have been preserved testifying to the release of slaves - six manumissions of the 1st and 2nd centuries. n. e. Most often, these inscriptions, carved on marble slabs, record acts on the release of slaves and slaves under the guise of their dedication to a deity or temple.
A similar method of granting freedom to slaves was widely practiced in Greece. The spread of freedmanship in the Bosporus in the first centuries of our era speaks of the emergence of new phenomena in the social life of the Bosporan society. They are also evidenced by the change in the appearance of the agricultural territory. Many small unfortified villages disappear. In the vicinity of the city in the last centuries BC and in the 1st century. n. e. fortified agricultural estates grow.
One of these estates was discovered in 1964 by an archaeological expedition of the Moscow Regional Pedagogical Institute named after N. K. Krupskaya near the Rassvet farm, 10 km east of Anapa. This is a large stone building, consisting of two rooms. It has existed since the 2nd century. BC e. according to the 1st century n. e. Massive stone walls up to 1.5 m thick made it look like a small fortified castle. This building was probably the center of a large agricultural estate. Its owner was a Bosporan, perhaps a Hellenized Sindh. The house contained terracotta figurines of the goddess, a young man, and others similar to those found in the graves and houses of the Gorgippians. During the excavations of the manor, iron tools were found indoors and in the household yard: hoes and spades, two plowshares, a garden knife. A similar fortified estate near the village of Natukhaevskaya was discovered at the end of the 19th century. famous Russian archaeologist V.I. Sizov.

The Greeks played an important role in the history of Ukraine; they appeared in the 7th century BC. e. on the northern shores of the Black Sea and founded ancient city-states here. As an organic part of the ancient civilization, they were formed and developed in close interaction with the local Black Sea population. The latter, for a whole millennium, felt the influence of high ancient culture, which was reflected in the acceleration of their socio-economic and cultural development.

There are two main periods in the history of the ancient city-states of the Northern Black Sea region. The first covers the time from the VI to the middle of the I century. BC and is characterized by a relatively independent life on the basis of Hellenic traditions and peaceful relations with the Scythian tribes. The second falls on the middle of the 1st century. BC e. - 70s of the IV century. n. e., when the city-states gradually fell into the sphere of interests of Rome and, moreover, experienced constant destructive attacks by the Goths and the Huns.

In the process of ancient colonization in the Northern Black Sea region, four main cells were formed.

The first is the coast of the Dnieper-Bug and Berezan estuaries. In the first half of the VI century. BC, on the right bank of the Bug estuary, not far from the place where it flows into the Dnieper estuary, immigrants from Miletus founded Olbia - later one of the three largest ancient Greek cities of the Northern Black Sea region, its convenient geographical position contributed to the establishment of close trade ties with the farmers of the forest-steppe and the nomads of the steppe.

The second center of the ancient civilization of the South of Ukraine was formed in the area of ​​the Dniester estuary, where the cities of Nikoniy and Tipa were located.

The third center was formed in the Southwestern Crimea. The main city here is Tauric Chersonese.

The fourth center of ancient culture in the Northern Black Sea region arose on the Kerch and Taman Peninsulas. The cities of Panticapaeum were built here. Feodosia, Phanagoria.

Rice. 1.5

The Greek city-states in the Black Sea region were called policies. In addition to the Bosporus, these were slave-owning democratic or aristocratic republics with appropriate administration. The structure of city-states also included the rural district - chora.

The main center from where the Greeks got to the south of modern Ukraine was Miletus - a city in the western part of Asia Minor. There are several reasons for relocation. The main ones are the overpopulation of Hellas, the lack of free land for agriculture, and other markets for handicraft goods.

Ancient cities were planned and built according to the standards and norms of mainland Greece. In the Northern Black Sea region, the following planning systems were used: rectilinear, mixed (rectilinear and radial). The city was divided into quarters with one to four houses. In addition to residential and outbuildings in the cities, there were theaters, gymnasiums, temples, sanctuaries, administrative buildings. They were built using order styles. The most common were: Doric, Ionian, Corinthian. Stone was used in construction, the roof was covered with tiles. The city was protected by a wall. Some cities of the Black Sea region had additional fortifications - the acropolis. The center of the city was the agora - the main square of the city. Here was a temenos - places of worship.

Outside the walls of the city was a necropolis - the burial place of the dead. Gradually, the Greek cities - colonies are united. So in 480 BC. The Bosporus kingdom arose, which united more than 20 Greek cities that existed on the territory of the Kerch Peninsula and Taman. The capital city of the kingdom was Panticapaeum (the modern city of Kerch). From the 4th century BC separate tribes of the Sea of ​​Azov, the North Caucasus, and the Kuban region were included in the Bosporan kingdom.

Rice. 1.6

The main occupations of the Greeks of the Northern Black Sea region were agriculture, cattle breeding, viticulture, and fishing. Handicraft was at a high level: metalworking, pottery, weaving.

An important place in the economic life of Olbia, Chersonese and other cities was occupied by agriculture and cattle breeding. For example, Olbia had its own agricultural territory - the chora, where its inhabitants could grow bread and vegetables, and graze cattle. The inhabitants of the settlements surrounding Olbia were also engaged in agriculture and cattle breeding. Fishing was very developed in the coastal regions. Chersonese developed from the very beginning as a center of agricultural production. The inhabitants of the city owned a significant agricultural area. The western coast of the Crimea, the Chersonesians called "the plain", was the granary of Chersonesus, which supplied the city with grain. The territory in the extreme south-west of Crimea, now called the Herakleian Peninsula, was divided into a large number of allotments-clairs 25-30 hectares in size. Clair was a plot of land with a fortified manor, which usually consisted of a house, various outbuildings, and a water tank. The clairs also included gardens, pastures and fields.

Handicraft production played a significant role. Thus, the Olbian craftsmen achieved great success in the manufacture of metal products cast from bronze or copper, mirrors, ornaments, figurines, which were often made in the "Scythian animal style". Ceramic production, jewelry, woodworking, weaving and other crafts developed in Olbia. Metallurgical, jewelry, textile enterprises worked in Chersonese. A variety of ceramics were produced. Chersonesos handicrafts were sold not only in the city itself, but also outside it - in the Scythian settlements of the Crimea.

Trade has been widely developed. Grain, cattle, skins, fur, salted fish, salt came to the cities from the chora and all of Scythia, and from there they were exported to Greece. Metal and jewelry, weapons, fabrics, marble, tableware, spices, olive oil, luxury goods and art, wines came from Greece to the Black Sea region. Slaves were a common commodity. Yet the main trade commodity was bread.

Contacting with the Greeks through trade, the local population got acquainted with ancient culture, the achievements of Greek society. After all, in the Greek colonial cities, as well as in Greece itself, writing also spread, sciences developed: history, philosophy, literature.

Ryas. 1.7

ra, medicine. Theaters, temples, were decorated with sculptures, frescoes, mosaics.

In the 1st century BC. policies become dependent on the Roman Empire and the city is still functioning. Unlike the Greek colonists, who, having established themselves in the Northern Black Sea region, became one of the main factors in the socio-economic development of the region, the Romans behaved like conquerors. They had no support from local population. The Roman occupation of the Black Sea region and the inclusion of most cities in the Roman Empire could not significantly change the situation, since the Romans considered these cities only as a source of food and slaves, as transfer points in trade and diplomatic relations with the "barbarian world".

In the III century. AD, the city-colonies on the territory of the Northern Black Sea region enter a period of general economic and socio-political disorder, which led after more than a hundred years to their final death. The cities received the greatest blow from the Gothic and Hunnic tribes. IV century ceases to exist as the city-state of Olbia. Only Chersonesos and Panticapaeum were revived, which became part of the Byzantine Empire. Chersonese, known as the city of Korsun, was destroyed by the Golden Horde conquerors in the middle of the 15th century. The same fate befell Panticapaeum and Theodosius.

On the coast of the Black Sea, which the Greeks called Pontus Euxinus, the Hellenic city-states coexisted with a huge array of local tribes of the Scythians, Thracians, Getae, Colchians, Sinds, Meots, Dandarians, Achaeans, Heniochs, Zigs, Mosks, Mossinois, Cappadocians, Paphlagonians, Mariandines, Bithyns and others.

Some of them already had states at an early stage of development: Thrace, Getica, Colchis, the Celtic kingdom of Tila, Caucasian Albania, Scythia, Sarmatia, where in the late Hellenistic and early Roman times siraki and aorsi rose (the territory of the latter was even called Great Aorsia), and more small tribes had their kings, more like tribal leaders. Most of these tribal unions and early state formations was built on the conquest of neighboring lands.

Scythians and Sarmatians. Scythian tribes appeared in the Black Sea region in the second half of the 7th century. BC. The first political strengthening of Scythia occurred after the defeat of the Persian army led by King Darius I in 518 BC, when, as a result of the victory of the Scythians over the Persians, certain influential Scythian clans and tribal leaders began to extend their dominance to the rest of their fellow tribesmen and even threaten the Greek cities. This was especially noticeable in the Northwestern Black Sea region, where the domain of the most powerful Scythian kings was located, which from that time turned into main arena military-political expansion of the Scythians. If in the VII-VI centuries. BC. the Scythians invaded Asia Minor through the Caucasus and the Eastern Black Sea region, then with the formation in 480 BC. on the shores of the Kerch Strait of the Bosporan state and the advance of the Sauromatians, a new group of Iranian-speaking nomads, from the Southern Urals and the Caspian Sea, expansion into the Caucasus for the Scythians became more and more difficult. This became especially evident when the Bosporan tyrants seized Sindika, including it in their state.

The second political heyday of Scythia is associated with an attempt to unite disparate tribes and their leaders in the first half - the middle of the 4th century. BC. This was the time when the power of King Ateas was strengthened there, embracing the North Thracian tribes. After inflicted on him in 339 BC. By the Macedonian king Philip II of a serious defeat, Scythia as a political entity broke up into separate tribal unions headed by leaders, whom the Greeks traditionally called kings. In an effort to consolidate their success and finally subjugate the Scythians, the Macedonians, on the orders of the governor of Alexander the Great, Antipater, organized in 331 BC. military expedition against the Getae and Scythians, led by an experienced commander Zopyrion. With a 30,000-strong army, he reached the Lower Bug region, where, under the walls of the Greek city of Olbia, he was defeated by the combined forces of the townspeople and the Scythians (the Greek tradition called them "Borisfenites" after the name of the Dnieper River - the ancient Borisfen). During the retreat through the waterless steppes of the Dniester region, the army of Zopyrion was finally defeated by the Getae and Scythians.

The defeat of such a powerful enemy again strengthened the Scythian tribes, which in 328 BC. made a military campaign against the Bosporan kingdom. However, the Bosporan king Perisad I, at the cost of great efforts, managed to repulse this attack. Despite the defeat, the Scythian nomadic aristocracy - the descendants of the so-called "royal Scythians" of Herodotus - still continued to dominate in Scythia, collecting tribute from settled farmers in the Lower Dnieper, Lower Bug and Lower Dniester regions. However, at the turn of the 4th-3rd centuries, but mainly from the first quarter of the 3rd century. BC, separate Sarmatian tribes, among which the warlike Roxolans stood out, increasingly began to cross the Don and invade the Scythian steppes, disturbing the Scythian tribal elite.

Already from the IV century. BC, but mainly in the III-II centuries. BC, part of the Sarmatian tribes, who generally remained nomads, gradually switched to settled life in the most convenient places for agriculture - in the Lower Don and Kuban regions, where they mixed with the Meots. These were originally agricultural tribes that lived in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. The transition to settled life took place among the Sarmatians in those areas where from the VI century. BC. agriculture was actively developed and cereal crops were grown. At the same time, the Sarmatian nobility, who preserved the traditions of nomadic cattle breeding and tributary, benefited from the fact that they took tribute from settled tribesmen, as well as from conquered tribes and rich Greek cities of Olbia, Tyra and the Bosporan kingdom. As sources show, for example, a decree of ca. 200 BC in honor of the noble Olbian citizen Protogenes, the information of the Greek geographer Strabo (1st century BC) and the Chersonesos decree in honor of Diophantus, the commander of Mithridates Eupator (end of the 2nd century BC), the Greek states were burdened by this tribute, which undermined their well-being, and in the Bosporus also the foundations of the ruling dynasty.

The transition from a nomadic lifestyle to a settled way of life, a rich tribute, luxurious gifts from the Greeks, and later diplomatic gifts from the Romans to representatives of the tribal elite, participation in foreign wars to obtain military trophies and seize new lands - all this led to a pronounced social and property stratification , the enrichment of the nobility and the transformation of tribal leaders into sole rulers, whom the Greeks and Romans still called kings. Among the Scythians of the Crimea in the II century. BC. the kings Argot, Skilur, Palak advanced to the leading positions in politics, and among the Sarmatians in the 1st c. BC. - I century. AD the kings of the Kuban Siraks Abeak and Zorsin and the kings of the Aorses in the Trans-Kuban and Northern Caspian regions Spadin and Evnon. Among the Sarmatians, who did not have a stable state, the strengthening of the power of tribal leaders did not contribute to overcoming fragmentation and did not eliminate the need to change habitats. The reason for this was that intertribal struggle persisted in the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region, and the nobility constantly sought to seize booty and new lands, and not with the aim of developing agricultural production, but to turn them into pastures. At the same time, the collection of tribute from the settled population of the steppe regions and the agrarian periphery of Greek cities remained a source of enrichment for the tribal elite. This was one of the reasons

Northern Black Sea region II c. BC. - II centuries. AD

1 - Directions of tribal migrations; 2 - the territory of the Roman Empire in the II century. AD; 3 - territory of the Bosporus kingdom

movements of the Sarmatians from the Don and the North Caucasus to the Dniester and Danube, where in the II century. BC. Sarmatians appeared - "royal", Iazygi and Urgi, and later - at the turn of the eras and in the 1st century. AD - Aorsi tribes. The latter in the first half - the middle of the 1st century. AD in the interfluve of the Dniester and the Dnieper, they formed their kingdom, headed by Farzoy, Inismey and a certain Umabiy, whom the Romans and Greeks called one of the kings of the Great Aorsia. The close connection of the Aorsian tribal elite with Olbia is confirmed by the gold coins minted there by the kings Farzoi and Inismey, as well as numerous embassies of the Olbiopolites and Romans to the "kings of the Great Aorsia". In the second half of the 1st c. AD Tribes of militant Alans moved to this region from the east, which were also ruled by tribal leaders - "Kings of the Alans", as they were called by the Bosporans and Romans.

KSh in. BC. under the pressure of the Sarmatian tribes from the east and the Celtic tribes from the west, most of the Scythian tribes advanced to Dobruja, where, since the time of King Atey, the Scythians exploited the settled local tribes of the Getae. The Scythian state in Dobruja, which received the name "Small Scythia" from the Greeks, existed approximately from the middle - the second half of the 3rd century to the end of the 2nd or the beginning of the 1st century. BC. This early class, with strong remnants of tribal relations, the state was built on the traditional relationship for Iranian nomads between the settled agricultural population and the Scythian aristocracy - tributary in favor of the nobility and the use of the economic potential of Greek cities to generate income in the form of the same tribute, but with their agrarian districts. The Scythian kings in Dobruja - Remax, Fradmon, Tanusa, Kanit, Sariak, Akrosak, Haraspa, Eliy, whom we know by their names from the inscriptions of Istria, Tom, Odessa and from the coins minted by them, had good relations with the Greek Western Pontic policies, established ties with Hellenistic kings of the Eastern Mediterranean and recruited Greek strategists and mercenaries. However, such a policy led only to the superficial Hellenization of the late Scythian society, without affecting its socio-economic basis - land ownership, which belonged to the Getic communities. The late Scythian kingdom in Dobruja was not Hellenistic in the full sense of the term: one of the distinguishing features of Hellenism was the founding of cities as centers of crafts and trade, while the polis civil community received part of the land property that remained in the hands of the supreme owner-king. The Danubian Scythians did not establish any policies, they limited themselves to levying tribute from the Greek cities and their environs. The Greek cities of the Western Black Sea region, which had arisen during the Greek colonization, remained formally independent of the Scythian rulers.

Under the pressure of the Getic tribes that strengthened south of the Danube, as well as the more frequent invasions of the Sarmatians, Bastarns and Britolags (Celts from Central Europe), the Scythian kingdom in Dobruja fell. As a result, the Scythians and part of the Getic (Thracian) tribes moved to the interfluve of the Southern Bug and the Southern Dnieper. Modern studies of the Lower Dnieper settlements, which were previously part of the remote rural district of Olbia, show that most of them are being revived at the turn of the 2nd-1st centuries. BC. Here on the agricultural settlements II-I centuries. BC. Archaeologists discovered Geta pottery. It shows that the population of these settlements included Scythians, Bastarns, Getae, i.e. ethnic substratum that came from the Western Black Sea region.

Another enclave of late Scythian culture developed in Taurica, where the Scythians also established their kingdom. This was preceded by devastating raids between the Don and Dnieper rivers of the Sarmatians, obviously the Roxolans, when a significant part of the population of Scythia, according to ancient tradition, was defeated and destroyed. The main blow of the Sarmatian nomads was directed to the west, but their periodic raids also affected the Crimean steppes. Already in the first half of the III century. BC. separate Sarmatian detachments reached the possessions of Tauric Chersonese, a Greek city in Southwestern Taurica. In the second half of the 3rd - beginning of the 2nd c. BC. The Sarmatians became allies of the Chersonesians, whose lands were attacked by the neighboring Scythians. The union of Chersonese and the Sarmatians, led by King Gatal, which they concluded against the Scythians, even gained international fame. These two Black Sea states in 179 BC. were among the participants in the peace treaty that marked the end of the war in Asia Minor between Pharnaces I, the king of the Pontic kingdom, and a coalition of neighboring kingdoms. By participating in this peace treaty, Chersonesos not only sought to consolidate an alliance with the Sarmatians in order to protect himself from their possible invasions, but to a greater extent intended to use it to attract the Pontic kingdom and even the Romans into allies. This succeeded, and in the same 179 BC. Tauric Chersonesus concluded an agreement on alliance and mutual assistance with Pharnaces I, according to which, in the event of an attack by "neighboring barbarians" on his chorus, the Pontic king was obliged to provide assistance to the Chersonesites. The treaty was directed both against the Sarmatians and against the Scythians of Taurica.

The appearance of the first Sarmatian burials in the II-I centuries. BC. in the Sivash region and north of Perekop indicates that the Sarmatians have not yet established themselves in Central Taurica. Their advance into the Crimea was hindered by the formation in the 2nd century. BC. and the rapidly growing Late Scythian kingdom, whose capital is Naples (on the outskirts of modern Simferopol). Therefore, until the fall of this state at the end of the II century. BC. Sarmatians were limited only to individual raids on the Tauride lands. This is well illustrated by archaeological excavations in Scythian Naples. OK. 130 BC, after the destruction that arose at the beginning of the II century. BC. and the complex of fortified buildings on its acropolis expanded in the middle of this century, which apparently happened as a result of another raid (maybe Sarmatian), Naples turned into a palace and cult center - the residence of the late Scythian kings Argot and Skilur, who came from the same royal family. The heyday of the Late Scythian state and its capital fell on the second half of the 2nd century BC. BC. OK. 114-107 AD BC. they were conquered by Mithridates Eupator, the ruler of the Pontic kingdom.

The relatively late emergence of the Scythian state in Taurica coincided with the strengthening of the Late Scythian kingdom in Dobruja, the absence of settled Scythian settlements in the Lower Dnieper, the reorganization of the rural district on the European Bosporus, when in the central regions of the Kerch Peninsula from the first half of the 3rd century. BC. the unfortified agricultural villages-koma, which belonged to the Scythian sedentary farmers, ceased to exist, and by the end of the century large fortified settlements and estates began to appear. Scientists believe that one of the main reasons for these changes is the strengthening of the Sarmatians in the Northern Black Sea region and the emergence of new tribes there - the Satarkhs. As a result of this, part of the Scythians from the chora of the Bosporus could move to the Central Crimea, and another group of the settled Lower Dnieper agricultural population, including the Scythian, could move to Dobruja and partially to Taurica.

Science is still debating when the Sarmatian tribes came to the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region and ousted the Scythians from there. About these events on the far periphery of the ancient world, a colorful description of Diodorus has been preserved: “These last (i.e. Sarmatians), having become stronger many years later, devastated a significant part of Scythia and, completely exterminating the vanquished, turned most of the country into a desert.” For a long time, this evidence was attributed to events that supposedly happened towards the end of the 4th - beginning of the 3rd century. BC. At present, they are convincingly associated with the situation in the Northern Black Sea region in the 2nd century BC. BC, and some even attribute them to the pre-Hellenistic era. The fact is that archaeological evidence dates the distribution of Sarmatian burial sites in the northern Black Sea steppes not earlier than the 2nd century BC. BC. However, this does not in the least contradict the fact that the first invasions of the Sarmatian tribes into Scythia began already in the first half to the middle of the 3rd century BC. BC. These invasions gradually led to the disappearance of the Scythian monuments of the 3rd - early 2nd century BC. BC. They also exacerbated the situation in the Lower Don region, where the Greek-barbarian emporium ceased to exist at the Elizavetovsk settlement. The appearance of the Sarmatians affected the situation in the regions of the North-Western Crimea subject to Chersonesos and in the chorus of Olbia. The final settlement of the Sarmatians in the northern Black Sea steppes was completed by the middle of the 2nd century. BC, which is confirmed by archeology. Therefore, the processes of the formation of new ethnopolitical associations in the Northern Black Sea region could stretch for approximately 50-100 years.

Among the new population that appeared in Taurica, there were also weakly Hellenized sedentary farmers, inhabitants of the former chora of the Greek states of Olbia and the Bosporus. They mixed with representatives of the Taurus sedentary population of the foothills, who owned the settlements of the Kizyl-Koba culture of the 4th - early 3rd centuries. BC, including those found in the vicinity of Naples. Together with the devastation of Scythia by the Sarmatians, such migrations and the adaptation of newcomers to the new living conditions required some time, which explains the relatively late rise of Crimean Scythia.

The kings of the Taurian Scythians Argot and Skilur carried out an active foreign policy and extended power to Olbia, the Lower Dnieper and the Bug region. A highly fragmented and clearly funerary Greek inscription found near the heroon of King Argoth in Scythian Naples says that this ruler “for the sake of the Hellenes of love and friendliness, defending [the homeland, against the hordes] of the Thracians and Meotians with many forces ... punished God and scattered..." Based on this inscription, it becomes clear why in the second half of the 2nd century. BC. Skilur minted his

coins in Olbia. The Scythian nobility was interested in good relations with the Greeks in order to receive income from trading activities and use the resources of the Olbian choir. The Olbiopolites, in turn, also benefited from friendship with the Crimean Scythians, since it relieved them of the need to pay tribute to the Sarmatian kings, which Olbia until recently had to regularly do during the time of Protogenes and the king of the royal Sarmatians (= Sais) Saitafarn. The Scythian protectorate gave them the opportunity to profit from the trade in grain from agricultural holdings, now subject to the Scythian kings, including in the North-Western Crimea. Olbia recognized the protectorate of the Scythian kings after the predecessor of Skilur, King Argot, according to his funerary inscription, defeated the "Thracians", i.e. Getae, who came to the Lower Dnieper from Scythia Minor in Dobruja under pressure from the Celtic tribes. Since that time, the chain of settlements along the Lower Dnieper became the main producer of agricultural resources for the Scythian and Olbian nobility. Some noble Olbiopolites entered the service of the Scythian kings, helped them in the fight against the satarchs, as evidenced by the activities of Posideus, the son of Posideus, who left a number of dedicatory inscriptions to the Greek gods in Scythian Naples. Hellenic architects built in Naples not only a palace and cult complex, as evidenced by Greek graffiti on the walls of the palace, but also built its powerful defensive walls following the model and canons of classical Hellenistic fortification.

The mention of the victory over the "Meots" in the inscription of Argot testifies to the active rebuff that the Taurian Scythians had against the Sarmatian tribes who came from the Kuban region, where the Siraks and partly the lower Aorses as early as the 3rd century BC. BC. mixed with the Meotian population, and therefore the Scythians could well call them the common ethnic term "Meots". The confrontation with the aggressive Sarmatians, who demanded tribute from the Bosporan kings, pushed the Crimean Scythia and the Bosporan state into each other's arms: at first this was expressed in the conclusion of dynastic marriages: between Argot and the Bosporan queen Kamasaria, and then between Skilur's daughter, princess Senamotis, and Heraclides, representative of the Spartocid dynasty. It was then that a group of noble Scythians settled in the Bosporan capital Panticapaeum, including a certain Savmak, a relative of the Scythian kings, who even had the right to claim the Bosporan throne. Such a policy soon made it possible to conclude a military-defensive alliance between the Bosporus and Crimean Scythia, directed against the Sarmatians. In Crimean Scythia itself, the constant threat of Sarmatian invasions necessitated the construction of new fortifications, the names of which are preserved in the sources - Palakiy, Napit, Khabei. They, especially the royal fortress of Palaki, named after the son-heir or co-ruler of Skilur, King Palak, and Napit, which received the name from the Scythian tribe of Napei, like Naples, could also be palace-cult complexes and centers of tribal groups or associations led by representatives of the ruling Scythians of the Argot and Skilur clans, who had many sons and daughters. In Crimean Scythia, heavily fortified settlements of Bulganakskoye, Zayachye, Ust-Alma and some others are known, the heyday of which dates back to the second half of the 2nd century BC. BC. - middle of the 1st c. AD, therefore the mentioned

above, the names of the royal fortresses of the Scythians could well refer to these settlements.

If Olbia and the Kingdom of Bosporus entered into a close alliance with the Scythians of Taurica, then Tauric Chersonesos, whose choir adjoined the possessions of the Scythian kings, stubbornly resisted attempts to seize from him the grain-growing lands in the North-Western Crimea and extend their protectorate to it. The intransigence of the Chersonesians was explained, apparently, by the fact that they had previously entered into contractual relations with the Sarmatians against the Scythians, while Olbia and the Bosporus initially saw an obvious threat in the Sarmatian tribes. However, despite the periodic assistance of the Sarmatians and the agreement with the Pontic king Farnak I, by the third quarter of the 2nd century. BC. Chersonese nevertheless lost most of its agricultural holdings. As a result of their transition under the authority of the Crimean Scythia, Scythian settlements appeared on the site of the former Chersonesos fortified settlements and rural estates in Western Taurica, as well as in the subject cities of Kerkinitida and Kalos Limen. This was in direct accordance with the processes of sedentarization among the Scythians after the events in the steppes of the Black Sea region at the end of the 3rd - 2nd centuries. BC, which led to an increase in the number of their rural communities and an increase in the volume of grain receipts in the form of tribute paid by these communities to the Scythian tribal aristocracy. The latter resold it to Greek merchants, so the annexation of Western Taurica contributed to the penetration of Olbian and other Greek elements into the Scythian environment, which contributed to the Hellenization of the Scythian elite.

There is a dispute in science whether the Late Scythian kingdom in Taurica can be considered a Hellenistic state. At present, the prevailing point of view is that it, like the Pozne-Scythian kingdom in Dobruja, was an early class formation with remnants of tribal division. This is confirmed by the preservation of tributary relations between the Scythian tribal elite and the settled rural population in Central and North-Western Taurida, the Lower Dnieper and the Lower Bug, including the former possessions of the Greek policies of Olbia and Chersonese. The absence of royal land ownership in the presence of agricultural and rural communities, the construction of royal fortresses - the residences of tribal leaders-kings of the paradynast type (many of them were of the royal family), the superficial Hellenization of only a narrow layer of the nobility - all this did not allow the Scythian states in the Crimea and Dobruja to develop along the path of Hellenistic statehood. But the most important thing that distinguished the Scythian kingdoms from the Hellenistic ones was the absence of policies, the land ownership of which would fit into the structure of the supreme royal land ownership. After all, the Scythian kings Argot, Skilur and Palak, like their relatives in Dobruja, according to a tradition dating back to the reign of King Atey, sought only to use the potential of the previously founded Greek cities to extract profit and enrich the tribal aristocracy in accordance with the historically established canons of tributary, and not by improving the forms of land ownership. The development of socio-economic relations, as in the Hellenistic kingdoms, began among the Crimean Scythians only after the Pontic, and then the Bosporus occupation, when during the 1st century. BC. - the first half of the 3rd c. AD, as a result of a series of aggressive campaigns of the Bosporan kings in

Taurica, the united Crimean kingdom of the Scythians and Taurians turned into a state dependent and vassal of them. Due to the influx of Sarmatian and Hellenized elements from the Bosporus, where Hellenistic forms of dependence and land ownership had formed by that time, the processes of population settling to the ground intensified in Crimean Scythia, the need for urban centers increased due to the transformation of community-tribal relations into something similar to class-estate division. As a result, from the 1st c. AD Scythian Naples turned from a tribal-type palace and burial complex into an urban center with chaotically built-up quarters.

Thrace and the kingdoms of the Daco-Geta. A feature of this region was the absence of a long-term Macedonian conquest, since Philip II and Alexander of Macedon had to subdue only individual Thracian tribes, leaving the conquest of the entire country for the future. Philip II annexed to his kingdom a small territory between the Strymon and Nesta rivers, inhabited by Odrysian tribes, but already in the 30s of the 4th century. BC. The Odrysian kingdom became independent. Alexander's plans included exclusively the conquest of the South Thracian Triballi tribe, after which he turned to the conquest of Asia. The defeat of Zopyrion in Scythia and Getica, which was discussed above, further undermined the Macedonian power in Thrace. Episodic invasions of the Seleucids and Ptolemies during the 3rd - early 2nd centuries. BC. were limited only to coastal areas in the region of Apollonia Pontus and Thracian Chersonese. Despite the fact that the Macedonian rulers founded cities and military-economic settlements (colonies) mainly in the southern regions of Thrace, trying to turn the Thracian lands into a royal domain, they failed to create a strong system of Hellenistic socio-economic relations and administrative management there.

With the collapse of the power of Alexander, Thrace (mainly the southern regions) went to his associate Lysimachus. But his power in the north of the Balkan Peninsula was fragile: it was based on the subjugation of individual tribes, which remained under the rule of local dynasts associated with Lysimachus by vassal relations. The Macedonian king tried to create a network of small "client" possessions there, headed by his vicegerents-strategists or hyparchs, who soon turned into independent rulers. Among them stood out Adey among the north-Odrysian tribes and Skostok in Enos, as well as Epimen, who recognized the power of the Thracian king Seut III, and subsequently passed to Spartacus, who became king after the death of Lysimachus in 281 BC. The control system created by Lysimachus was not durable, since the Thracians, led by Seut III, resisted the Macedonian conqueror. This led to the formation in Thrace of many tribal groups and alliances that united around Seut III solely to repulse an external enemy. But as soon as the threat decreased, they immediately turned into independent tribal formations, only nominally subordinate to the king.

A conglomerate of semi-independent tribal unions developed in Thrace from its traditional institution of "paradynasty", which took shape as early as the 6th-4th centuries. BC. in the Odrysian kingdom as a result of its territorial

tribal division. This led to the isolation of certain areas within the kingdom and weakened the central authority. This situation became one of the most important reasons for the collapse of the early Thracian Odrysian state at the end of the 4th - beginning of the 3rd century. BC. into several minor dynasties. The paradynasts, co-rulers of the kings and leaders of the small politically independent enclaves that had developed among the Thracians, persisted for a long time and became the cause of the fragility of the common Thracian state, where there were remnants of tribal division. Tribal fragmentation did not allow organizing a rebuff to the invasion of the Galatian Celts in Thrace and the formation there in 281 BC. their states centered in Thiel. The attempt to create a united Celtic-Thracian state under King Kavar did not lead to the consolidation of the tribes into a single kingdom, since the Tila state was built on the subordination of the Thracians to the leaders of the Galatian tribes. The Thracian nobility was burdened by this dependence and did not want to share the booty that the Thracian tribes and the Galatians jointly captured when attacking the Greek cities.

Seut III - Thracian king. Bronze. 3rd century BC. Sofia

After the fall of the kingdom of Tila in 218 BC. the Thracians continued to create temporary tribal unions for predatory attacks on Macedonia, which further strengthened their tribal disunity. Relations between the tribes were built on the principles of tributary between various dynasts and leaders, who shared war trophies and booty among themselves. The receipt of income from the exploitation of the Thracian agricultural communities became a secondary factor, yielding to the desire for easy prey during military invasions and in the service of more powerful kings. The policy of the Macedonian king Philip V also did not contribute to the unification of the Thracians. In 184 BC. a confederation of Thracian tribes led by King Amadokos was defeated by the Macedonians, which weakened Thrace and allowed the Macedonian king, who had made an agreement with the Bastarnae, to hold them in 179 BC. through the Thracian lands for the war with the Odris, opponents of the Macedonian expansion. This action turned out to be possible only in the absence of unity among the Thracian tribal unions, who did not want to recognize the rule of the Odrysian dynasts. The leaders of the tribes in the region of Tonzos and Gebra, who became virtually independent, were especially active against the Odris.

During the Third Macedonian War, the Roman Republic increasingly began to turn its eyes to the north of the Balkan Peninsula, since the Odris represented

King Kotis supported the Macedonian king Perseus. The Romans managed to win over the tribe of Kenites, and after 168 BC. and the fall of Macedonia, they initiated the minting of coins by the Greek policies of Thasos and Maroneia in order to use their financial and economic influence to attract the Thracians to their side in order to prevent their invasion of the Roman possessions. In the middle of the II century. BC. these vast cash flows were directed to support the pro-Roman position of the Kenites. However, the power of their kings in Thrace turned out to be short-lived, its rise was caused by a temporary weakening of the Odris and Asts after the fall of Perseus. The growth of the influence of the Kenite kings caused discontent among the Sapeians who supported the Romans, so the Odris soon went over to the side of Rome. From now on, they began to receive huge amounts of money from the Roman authorities. As a result, the more aggressive and backward tribes of the Besses and Medes, feeling left out, stepped up their anti-Roman actions and began to invade Greece and Macedonia - now Roman fiefdoms - on an even larger scale.

Strengthening of centralization tendencies in the development of Thracian statehood did not occur even after a short-term invasion of South-Eastern Thrace by Mithridates Eupator. The Pontic king was interested in attracting some of the most aggressive tribes for constant incursions into the Roman possessions in the Balkans, so these tribes remained only his vassals and allies. At the end of II - beginning of I century. BC. King of the Besses Mostis began to mint coins with Greek types, close to the coins of the Pontic king Mithridates. On the one hand, this testified to the superficial Hellenization of the tribal elite, and on the other, it symbolized allied relations with Pontus. As a result of the strengthening of the Besses and their alliance with the Pontic ruler, the Odrys tribes, led by Sadal I, decided to support the Romans. This is an indicator of the lack of unity in Thrace in the late Hellenistic era, since neither the Macedonians, nor the Pontics, nor the Romans, who actively acted at that time in the arena of the Black Sea region, could not stimulate the development of Hellenistic traditions during the formation united state in Thrace. They managed to keep in force only the separatism of individual tribal unions, trying to direct it into the mainstream of their foreign policy interests. In the confrontation between Macedonia and Rome, and then Rome and Pontus, the Odrysian tribes played a certain role, the kings of which adjoined one side or the other. However, they did not become a stronghold of Hellenization, conductors of Hellenistic statehood and culture, since the rest of the Thracian tribes did not want to follow in the wake of the policy of the Odrysian rulers.

The weakness of royal power and tribal fragmentation forced the Thracians to enter into friendly relations with the Greeks of the West Pontic coast. Thanks to the undeveloped administrative-territorial system of government in Thrace, the Hellenic policies, neighboring with the Thracians, managed to maintain agricultural possessions, enjoyed relative autonomy and independence. As early as the first half of the 3rd c. BC. the Odrysian king Cotys, son of Seut III, left his son Reskuporid as a hostage in Apollonia Pontus, as he wanted to enlist the support of this policy against the Seleucid king Antiochus II or the Celts; a little later, the Odrysian king Sadal I and the Greek city of Mesembria swore oaths to each other regarding the border, which speaks in favor of mutual partnership, and not the subordination of the Greeks to the Thracian king. In the middle of the 1st c. BC. a certain Greek Menogenes, the son of Asklepiad, a strategist of the Odrysian king Sadal II, who controlled a part of the land subject to the king, which adjoined the rural district of Odessa, was honored in this city by a special decree. The kings of the Thracians respected mutual agreements on the boundaries of their possessions and the choirs of cities: in the 1st century. BC, according to a decree from Dionysopol, a division was made between the territory subject to the Sapean king Cotys II, son of Rescuporides, and the agrarian possessions of Odessa, Callatis and Dionysopol. Their borders were fixed in accordance with ancient agreements in the presence of representatives of all contracting parties. This document clearly distinguishes the land that was under the control of the Thracian king, which was confirmed by his strategist Sadal, son of Mukaporis (obviously, a member of the Odrysian ruling house, strategist of the administrative-territorial district), and areas subject to polis collectives, which was previously recognized by the Thracians , and now officially confirmed by the Thracian Sapean king before the delegates from the Greek cities.

From a comparison of these inscriptions it follows that by the 1st c. BC. in Thrace, a certain transformation of the ancient institution of paradynasts took place with their practically complete independence in some semblance of a board of royal governors-strategists, more dependent on royal power. This was the result of increased centralization of power and marked the transition to the creation of a single state in Thrace in the middle of the 1st century BC. BC. At the same time, despite the external influence of the Hellenistic kingdoms, expressed in the appearance of administrative-territorial regions-strategies on the land subject to the kings, the remnants of tribal fragmentation still persisted. This was manifested in the fact that the strategies were created according to the ethno-tribal principle. On the other hand, the Thracian kings and dynasts strictly adhered to the rule not to capture the chora of the Greek cities, although some of the policies of the coast nominally recognized their protectorate. In addition, the relationship of tributary and vassalage persisted in Thrace until the 1st century BC. BC, which follows from the well-known resolution of the Roman Senate on the position of Thasos and the letter of Gnei Cornelius Dolabella about the relationship of this island center with the surrounding Thracian Sapeian tribes and their kings Remetalk, Tiuta and Abluporis. In the interior of the country, forms of communal ownership of land dominated, and the capitals of strategies were fortifications - royal residences and fortresses (such as Sevtopol and Kabile), or tribal semi-urban communities - the capitals of governorships, such as Biziya. Urbanization was only gaining momentum, while the Greek policies formally remained independent and were not included in the socio-economic structure of the Thracian kingdom of the Odrys-Sapeians, which resembled a tribal union rather than a Hellenistic state.

Hellenization - an indispensable attribute of Hellenistic statehood, touched only the tops of the tribes, the local aristocracy, and the general population and even individual tribes retained

its isolation. Therefore, the Odrysian-Sapeian state in Thrace in the 1st century BC. BC. -1 in. AD was early class with remnants of tribal relations.

Having strengthened itself in the north of the Balkan Peninsula and in Greece, the Roman Republic was not interested in the fragmentation of Thrace into tribal unions, because this led to instability and the danger of Thracian invasions within the new Roman provinces, mainly Macedonia. During the civil wars, many Thracian dynasts went over to the side of Rome, but supported various commanders: the Sapeians, Besses, Dardani, Odryses helped Pompey, then the Odryses, represented by Sadal II, supported Caesar and later the Republicans; the Sapean dynast Raskos became a supporter of Mark Antony, and his brother Reskuporides - Cassius and Brutus. Front decisive battle during Aktion, Odrys Sadal III and the Sapean dynast Remetalk I were allies of Mark Antony, but after his defeat, Remetalk passed to Octavian.

The unstable position of the Thracian dynasts in relation to the Roman generals was the result of tribal disunity and independence of local rulers, which hardly suited Rome. The Romans organized a number of military expeditions against the most irreconcilable Thracian tribes: after the campaigns of Mark Lucullus, Gaius Antony Hybrids, Mark Licinius Crassus and Mark Antony, the process of centralization of power in Thrace accelerated a little. At the head of the association were first the Odrises and Asts, and then, at the end of the 1st century. BC, Sapeians and their king Kotis II. However, a decisive breakthrough in the creation of a unified state occurred only under Emperor Augustus during the reign of his vassal king of the Sapees Remetalk I and under his successors - Kotis III, Remetalk II and Remetalk III, who already reigned under Tiberius, Caligula and Claudius. At this time (the last decade of the 1st century BC - 46 AD), the Thracian kingdom more and more resembled a Hellenistic state.

The Hellenization of the Thracians became more significant and was carried out under the influence of the Greek cities of the Black Sea coast, which was encouraged by the Romans. They even contributed to the inclusion of the Greek policies in the socio-economic structure of the kingdom of the Sapeians, Odrises and Asts. Emperor Tiberius decided to transfer under the control of Remetal II (19-38 AD) the coastal region, together with the Hellenic policies and their choir up to Istria, so that the Thracian king could more successfully collect taxes to strengthen his power; even the city of Philippopolis was given under his hand. Thus, a serious step was taken towards the creation of a Hellenistic state, since in the absence of a developed urban culture in Thrace, the Hellenic policies and their landed property became part of the state structure. At the same time, the polis agrarian periphery, as it were, fell under the control of the king, although the transition to royal land ownership in Thrace, in the form in which it happened in the classical Hellenistic kingdoms, has not yet occurred. After all, tribal communities continued to dominate in the interior of the country, which made it impossible to get rid of the relics of tribal fragmentation and paradynasty, the ethnic nature of strategies, and this hindered the development of a centralized state. As a consequence, after the death of Augustus in 13 AD. Thrace was divided between the northern and southern regions, led by their kings - Kotis III, a supporter of the Hellenistic-Roman

innovations, and his uncle, the dynast Rescuiorid III, who relied on the tribal groups of the Thracian nobility.

Attempts to elevate Romanized or Hellenized rulers to the throne, set on a close alliance with the Roman Empire, in order to form a new elite around them, ran into opposition from the tribal Thracian tribal aristocracy, which relied on the remnants of communal structures. This was clearly manifested in 19 AD. during the reign of King Kotis III, who adopted Greek and Roman culture, but was treacherously killed. The policy of the Hellenized local dynasts, openly expressing the interests of the Romans, since it was carried out under the supervision of the Roman quaestors, caused discontent, and then led to uprisings of the Thracian tribes, including the Odris, Koilaleti and Dii in 21 and 26. AD These speeches, in the words of Tacitus, were led by some "ignorant leaders", obviously representatives of the conservative tribal elite, dissatisfied with the influence of the aristocracy that supported the Hellenistic-Roman foundations, and the appointment of Roman guardians and advisers in Thrace such as praetor Trebellen Rufus, Gaius Julius Proclus and Lucius Antony Zeno.

In order to overcome tribal fragmentation and strengthen Hellenistic statehood, the Romans supported Remetalka II, having previously eliminated Reskuporides III, the initiator of the assassination of Kotys III, a friend of them. Having united the country under his rule, proclaiming Remetalka king, they allowed him to expand the power of the governors-strategists in order to strengthen the administrative-territorial districts-strategies, including by increasing them. One of these governors under Remetalk II was the strategist Apollonius, the son of Eptaikent, whose inscriptions were found in Burgas, Razgrad and Biziya. They show that a rather vast region of Thrace was under his rule. However, the royal title of Remetalka II preserved in these inscriptions is unique in its own way: it lists the ancestors of the king by paternal and maternal lines up to the second knee. This, according to researchers, was a relic of paradynasty and tribal fragmentation. Therefore, even at this time one should speak of a strong Hellenistic state among the Thracian tribes with a great deal of caution.

All this shows that the Hellenistic socio-economic relations developed among the Thracians solely on the basis of the genesis of the community and the tribal form of land ownership. The underdevelopment of royal land ownership due to the dominance of communal and tribal relations and the actual isolation of the Greek policies from the general Thracian state-political structures made it difficult for the development of Hellenistic relations, which caused instability of power. This was reflected in the maturation of a conspiracy with the subsequent assassination of the last king of the Sapean dynasty, Remetalka III (38-46 AD), which forced the Romans to abandon the creation of a Hellenistic-type vassal state in Thrace with a solid structure of military administrative control. Therefore, in 46 AD. Thrace became a Roman province, and Hellenization, coupled with Romanization, already took place within the framework of the Roman Empire.

Among the Daco-Gets, the North Thracian tribes in the Dobruja, the Danube Delta and the interfluve of the Danube and the Dniester, statehood was even weaker.

The short-term rise of the Geta tribal union under Dromichet the Elder at the end of the 4th - beginning of the 3rd century. BC. was a kind of reaction to the aggressive policy of the Macedonian Diadochus Lysimachus, who sought to extend power in the Danube region. The political and military weakness of the Getae at this time is confirmed by the complete absence of royal land ownership and the semi-independent position of the leaders of individual tribes. The leaders of the Getae recognized the power of the more powerful of them and united around him only in time of military danger, and subsequently moved away from each other. Therefore, the Getic tribes could not consolidate into a single state for a long time, the reason for which was, among other things, the invasions of the Celtic tribes and the Scythians.

The sources preserved references to the kings of the Getae, among which in the first half - the middle of the III century. BC. Dromichet stood out, probably the son of Dromichet the Elder, who joined the Odryses and the Seleucid king Antiochus II Theos. In the middle of the III century. BC. in the Northern Dobruja, on the Wallachian Plain and between the Dniester and Danube rivers, tribal unions were headed by Tsar Moskon, who issued silver coins with his title and name, and Zalmodegik, who, according to an inscription from Istria, did not have a royal title (like Dromihet the Younger). The Getae, led by Zalmodegic, attacked the chorus of Istria to collect tribute, part of which could then go to the more powerful ruler Moscon, who united a number of tribal unions around him to receive from their leaders a share of the booty from attacks on the Greek policies, mainly Istria. Predatory raids against the Istrian agrarian district continued at the turn of the 3rd-2nd centuries. BC. under the successor of Zalmodegicus Zolta, who with enviable regularity deprived the citizens of the city of the grown crop and received from them payoffs in gold. If the aggressiveness of the Getae towards the Greeks was previously explained by the desire of the stronger leaders-kings to levy tribute from petty rulers, then after the creation of the Scythian kingdom in Dobruja, the Geta rulers in the Danube Delta and on its right bank were forced to pay this tribute to the Scythian kings. All this, of course, did not contribute to good neighborly relations between the Greeks and the Getae, preventing the Hellenization of wide sections of the community members and reinforcing tribal fragmentation. That is why in the II century. BC. in Getika, independent petty kings continued to exist - tribal leaders, among whom the kings of Tiamarkos stood out in the northeast of the modern. Oltenii and Dapiks in the northern part of present-day Dobruja.

An attempt to strengthen statehood among the Getae was made by King Orol (Roles), who ruled in Eastern Transylvania and north of the Lower Danube, but this was not caused by the internal development of Getic society, but by the frequent invasions of the Bastarns. Despite the strengthening of his authority, it was not possible to overcome the fragmentation and tribal orders of the Getic community members. The alliance with Mithridates Eupator also did not become a breakthrough in this regard: a certain Dromichet served in his army, probably a distant descendant of Dromichet the Elder, but he did not have a royal title and was only a detachment commander in the army of the Pontic king.

The next step in the development of a unified state among the Getae was the policy of King Burebista, who ruled in the second quarter - the middle of the 1st century. BC. Some researchers evaluate his state as typical of the Hellenistic

cheskoe, but this is a clear exaggeration. The short duration of its existence (about 20 years), the complete destruction and plunder of the neighboring Hellenic cities of Olbia, Tyra, Istria, Kallatis and Tom by the Getae Burebista, the devastation of their choirs, the capture of hostages, the exodus of residents, as in Odessa, or serious defensive measures, as in Apollonia and Mesembria, - the result of actions typical of the Getae, tested even under Zalmodegica and Zolta, but on a larger scale. Under Burebista, who took the title of "the first and greatest of the Thracian kings", hostility to the Hellenic way of life, and even more so to the Romans, reached incredible proportions, despite the fact that the king maintained ties with the city of Dionysopol and one of its citizens, Acornion, and through him with Pompey himself. This prevented Hellenization and the formation of Hellenistic institutions of power and property. The royal title of Burebista showed only a superficial influence of Hellenism and reflected its superiority over other tribal leaders - kings. The Geta kingdom of Burebista did not cross the stage of tribal relations, only temporarily reducing the abyss of tribal fragmentation. It did not develop into a Hellenistic state with a predominance of royal land ownership, which would also include polis land ownership, as it was a typical union of tribes. The fragility of this state was clearly manifested in 44 BC, when, after the death of the king, it immediately fell apart, because it arose exclusively for the robbery of neighboring cities and tribes.

On the ruins of the kingdom of Burebista, four or five tribal unions arose with an extremely low level of influence of Hellenism and Romanization. This forced Rome to try to consolidate the Getae under its rule: even Caesar planned a campaign against Burebista, and representatives of the Julio-Claudian dynasty achieved the inclusion of some Geta lands in the Lower Danube into the Sapeian Thracian kingdom, vassal to the Romans. The Romans also resorted to dynastic ties, which manifested itself under Burebista's successor, King Cotisone. But Rome failed to achieve success in building the Getic state on the model of the Hellenistic kingdoms, even to the extent that it succeeded in Thrace. The reasons were the very weak Hellenization of the tribal elite of the Getae, the absence of urban centers with the predominance of fortified residences of tribal leaders, unneighborly relations with Greek cities. The Getic kings, such as Dapix and Cyrac, preferred to wage war against the Romans rather than be included in the subject rulers, the clients of Rome. Therefore, in order to deepen the processes of development of Hellenism and, above all, to attract the local tribal elite to its side by including it in the system of new land relations built by Rome, Dacia was required to join the empire. What was done by the beginning of the II century. AD, however, with great difficulty.

Thus, in the Western Black Sea region, two features of the formation of Hellenistic relations can be distinguished. One, typical of late Hellenism, when the Roman Republic, and then the empire, tried to build a system of client kingdoms in which Hellenistic traditions would become mainstream and stimulated from the outside, i.e. from Rome. This was partly successful in relation to the Thracian kingdoms of Asts, Odryses and Sapeians. Second

the feature is more characteristic of the Geto-Dacians, where neither Hellenic nor Roman influence even formed a semblance of a Hellenistic state that would express Roman interests. However, in general, in the North Balkan region and on the Lower Danube up to the Dniester region, the foundations for the progressive development of a strong Hellenistic statehood did not take shape, since this was hindered by tribal fragmentation, local communal traditions, which conserved the process of allocating individual family property to land, and hence the growth of royal property. land property. Therefore, only with the Roman conquest and the creation of provinces did the socio-economic and cultural changes characteristic of the Hellenistic era receive accelerated development (with the exception of the formation of the state).

Bosporus and Pontus. The Pontic kingdom (or Cappadocia of Pontus), which under Mithridates Eupator united around itself most of the Black Sea coast, was a typical Hellenistic state. Its social and economic structures were based on royal and polis land ownership, to which were added the vast temple land holdings of Comana, Zela and Ameria. On this basis, political power was also built, headed by the tsar, who relied on a military-administrative system of government with numerous governors in different territories. Its foundation was based on the typical Iranian features of managing vast regions, which had developed even under the Achaemenids. They were supported and developed by local dynasts, who were considered the heirs of this royal family, as well as one of the associates Persian kings- Otan, who received from Darius I vast land holdings in the north and east of Anatolia.

The heirs of the Achaemenids and Otanids, various Persian governors-satraps, had large land holdings in this region, which later formally came under the rule of the diadochis of Alexander the Great - Perdikki, Eumenes from Cardia, Antigonus One-Eyed and Lysimachus. Later, in the beginning-first half of the III century. BC, Northern Anatolia became the object of the aggressive policy of the Ptolemies and the Seleucids, but the Macedonian domination was not entrenched here. This was prevented by the active opposition of the coastal Greek policies and the Persian satraps, who retained their independence, since the conquest of the north of Asia Minor was not included in Alexander's plans. As a result, by the beginning of the III century. BC. a peculiar combination of Greek and local customs and traditions has developed here: enclaves of Hellenic policies with their hora, a fairly developed polis land tenure and Hellenized rural population, and a huge region within the country, which remained the property of the successors and heirs of the Persian satraps - large landowners who considered these domains to be ancestral possessions . The population of these regions, with the exception of the coastal zone, was very weakly Hellenized.

In the confrontation with the aggressive aspirations of the Seleucids and Lysimachus in 297 BC. in the North Anatolian region, the kingdoms of Pontus and Bithynia were formed, later the state of Cappadocia appeared. These formations were headed by representatives of the local nobility, who led the fight against the Macedonians in order to defend their domains and prevent them from falling into the hands of the Macedonian ruling elite. From the very beginning, their main task was to increase land holdings at the expense of neighboring territories as soon as possible. This process was especially pronounced in the Pontic and Cappadocian states, where local dynasts, in particular the Pontic Mithridatids, having strengthened themselves in the ancestral domain on the borders of Paphlagonia and Pontus, began to quickly annex new lands, expanding the size of their possessions and property. With the transformation of the dynasts into kings, their possessions and new acquisitions gradually transformed into royal land ownership, which retained not Macedonian, but traditional Achaemenid-Iranian features. It was firmly cemented by royal fortresses-residences, where taxes flowed and where the treasury was kept, garrisons were located to collect taxes and keep the settled population in obedience. Small vassal landowners have been preserved from the previous era, obliged by military service to the supreme rulers and by duty to field military detachments from communal peasants subject to them.

The Pontic state went through several stages in its development, but from the very beginning, its kings faced the main objective- annex the Greek cities of the coast and vast areas inland. From the 3rd century BC. The capital of Pontus was Amasia, a Greek polis in the basin of the Iris River, the birthplace of the Greek geographer Strabo. The desire to subjugate the Hellenic cities has always distinguished the Achaemenid satraps and Cappadocian rulers, but they did not always succeed. And when they did succeed, the cities temporarily recognized their protectorate, but at the same time retained autonomy and politics), without constituting a part of the socio-economic structure of the state. The policy of the Mithridatids was fundamentally different from earlier precedents: it went from a tough confrontation with the Hellenic policies and their subjugation with a minimum number of policy privileges to philhellenicism, when the Greek communities received expansion of political rights and a certain amount of land allotments. The Philhellenic policy began to be actively implemented after the unsuccessful war for Pontus in Asia Minor, when, according to the strict indemnity imposed on him in 179 BC. the winners - Pergamum, Bithynia and Cappadocia (whose back was Rome), the Pontic king Farnak I was forced to seek support from the Greek cities of the Black Sea region to strengthen the faltering economy. Since that time, the Pontic monarchs, up to Mithridates Eupator, sought to present themselves as "friends" of the Romans and Hellenes, however, in domestic politics, the rights of political autonomy and even the trading activities of the Greeks were under the control of the royal power. This held back the spread of Hellenistic traditions in the interior regions of Eastern Anatolia. After all, along with the construction of Greek cities (Farnakia, Laodicea, Mithridatium, Evpatoria) and the transformation of royal fortresses into policies, the kings erected new fortifications and citadels in the depths of the country, strengthening royal land ownership and providing domains to their friends and supporters from among the Iranian-Cappadocian, Paphlagonian and Greek aristocracy.

As a result of relying on the Greek policies, Mithridates Everget and his son Mithridates Eupator managed to bring the Pontic kingdom out of the crisis and eliminate the consequences of defeat in the war of 183-179. BC. and burden-

noah indemnity. This made it possible to start economic, and soon military-political expansion in the Black Sea region in order to create such a power, the vast regions of which, inhabited by Greeks, could feed the economy of the patrimonial possessions of the Pontic rulers in Asia Minor at the expense of their resources. The inclusion of Greek cities in it contributed to the spread of Hellenism in the Pontic state, and Hellenic traditions began to play one of the leading roles in the life of the kingdom, while Iranian and Anatolian traditions receded into the background. At the turn of II-I centuries. and in the first half of the 1st c. BC. The Pontic kingdom, relying on the Hellenic cities and royal fortresses on the royal lands, expanded its territories in Asia Minor, the Black Sea region and Thrace, including local barbarian tribes among its allies. This further strengthened his power, and the economy received an additional incentive to develop due to taxes and tribute from these regions. Mithridates VI began to mint abundant series of gold and silver coins, unified monetary circulation in the Black Sea region, which brought Pontus and the states and tribes located there closer together, expanded the land holdings of policies, and reformed the administrative and political administration. The tsar increased the number of vicegerent districts and, continuing to rely on the cities of Sinop, Amis, Amasia, Amastria, Farnakia and others, granted polis rights (though limited) to the former royal fortresses - Pimolis, Gaziur, Khabakte, Talaura. However, in general, the town-planning policy in Pontus was limited, since it was necessary to use mainly the economic potential of the ancient coastal Hellenic cities, which from ancient times had close ties in the Black Sea region. The interior regions of Pontic Cappadocia, Paphlagonia, Lesser Armenia and Colchis were still weakly Hellenized, largely due to the absence of city-forming centers. After in 110-95 years. BC. Following Chersonesus, Olbia and Tyra, the Bosporan Kingdom, Lesser Armenia and Colchis became part of Pontus, the control system that had developed in the Asia Minor possessions of the Pontic kings, political and economic relations spread there as well. This accelerated the Hellenization of the Pontic kingdom and neighboring regions.

Mithridates VI Eupator. Marble. 1st century BC. Paris Louvre

In the 100-80s BC. in the Bosporus, partly in Chersonese and Olbia, a certain upswing of the economy and military affairs began, as evidenced by

the minting of local coins, including silver, which was extremely unusual for the Pontic kingdom. This is a direct consequence of the Philhellenic policy of Mithridates Eupator, who relied on the Greek cities, which Mithridates Everget had previously done. The Pontic monarch counted on large incomes from the exploitation of polis lands and craft workshops in cities, as well as from the trading activities of Greek merchants. However, the tribute imposed by the king on the population of the Bosporus, the military defeat of Mithridates by the Romans in 85 BC. showed the precariousness of relying solely on the material resources of the Greek policies: the attitude of the Greeks towards Mithridates cracked, and some cities of the Bosporus and Colchis generally fell away from the king. As a result, the Pontic governors in the Northern and Eastern Black Sea region (the Western Black Sea region was officially subordinate to Mithridates as a protectorate) were forced to reduce the polis privileges of cities and cut down part of their land holdings. Approximately 80-75 years. BC. in the Bosporus (and, apparently, in Colchis), following the example of the ancestral possessions in Pontus and Paphlagonia, the strengthening of royal land ownership began in order not to lose the Bosporus, and indeed the entire Northern Black Sea region, as the main breadbasket of Pontus.

To strengthen his positions on the northern coast of the Euxine Pontus, Mithridates Eupator had to establish close ties with local tribes, mainly Sarmatians, who lived in the North Caucasus. The Sarmatian and Scythian nobility was interested in the military activities of the Pontic king, as this gave her the opportunity to enrich herself at the expense of military trophies. And ordinary community members who settled on the land in the Kuban region, the Eastern Crimea, the Don region and in other grain-growing regions were called up for royal service as katoiks - military and economic settlers, who were now settled in royal fortresses on royal land. They cultivated the land, sold the products of their labor in the cities and received pay, gifts and a share in the division of military trophies for participation in military campaigns. So the benefit was mutual both for the king and his Hellenic subjects, and for the barbarian aristocracy and ordinary community members. The enlargement of the royal land fund required the construction of new fortresses and settlements, as earlier in Asia Minor. Such a policy led to the growth of the economy, mainly handicrafts and agricultural production, as a result of which Mithridates Evpator regularly received large supplies of grain and other material resources from the Northern Black Sea region and from neighboring regions.

The Hellenization of the local population, reliance on royal fortresses, estates and "small" towns, while maintaining the positions of the old Hellenic policies of Panticapaeum, Nymphaeum, Gorgippia, Theodosia and Phanagoria in the economy, opened up the possibility for the mutually beneficial development of both Greek and local communities based on land ownership under control of royal power. Therefore, the Bosporus began to gradually turn from a polis-type state formation with a sole-tyrannical form of government (as under the Spartokids) into a typically Hellenistic kingdom, where Hellenic and local Iranian-Pontic traditions actively interacted, coupled with Sarmatian-Scythian features - the latter manifested itself mainly , on the rural periphery.

Throughout the long, with varying success, confrontation between the Pontic kingdom and the Roman Republic (the first war - 89-85 BC, the second - 83-80 BC, the third - 74-63 BC .e.) The Black Sea region, especially the Bosporus and Taurica, were the main suppliers of means for waging war. However, by 63 BC. Under the blows of the Romans, Mithridates Eupator suffered a series of serious defeats, lost all his possessions in Asia Minor and, having lost the confidence of his allies in Asia Minor, retired to the Bosporan kingdom. Here he hatched plans for new wars with Rome, for which he pumped out all possible means from cities and royal lands, which led to the impoverishment of the population and the inability of subjects to pay exorbitantly high taxes. As a result of the anti-Mithridatic uprisings in the cities and in the chorus, many industrial and commercial centers were destroyed, and the population increasingly looked to the Romans for support. When Mithridates saw that not only cities, but also previously loyal garrisons in the royal fortresses, as well as representatives of the barbarian nobility, rose up against him, he committed suicide. It was already his successors who had to bring the Bosporan kingdom out of the crisis, in particular his son Pharnaces II, who led a conspiracy and uprising against his father.

After the death of the Pontic king, the Romans, through the efforts of Gnaeus Pompey, divided his possessions: most of Eastern Anatolia was given to the Hellenistic dynasts and kings allied with Rome, and Bithynia, Northern Paphlagonia and part of Pontus were included in the new province of Bithynia-Pontus. But the main thing that the Romans demanded was to liquidate the military-administrative districts on the royal land, destroy the royal fortresses, build new cities, expand polis privileges and land holdings of Greek cities. Thus, in these territories began new stage in the development of Hellenism, since it now affected more extensive areas than "under the kings." However, in the Bosporus and partly in Colchis, the former Mithridatic regulations were left in force, since the Romans could not yet actively influence the processes taking place there. As a result, Farnak II, largely relying on the military-political and administrative structures created under his father, in 48-46. BC. organized an attempt to restore the Pontic kingdom, but was defeated by Caesar. His successors Asander, Dinamy, the granddaughter of Mithridates Eupator, Aspurg and Mithridates III concentrated their activities exclusively on the Bosporus: they not only completed the creation of the Hellenistic land tenure system there, based on a combination of royal land ownership, introduced under Mithridates, and the polis land tenure of the largest cities but also strengthened the position of royal power. They erected new fortifications throughout the kingdom, raised agricultural production, handicraft activities in the cities, retaining polis rights for some of them (Pantikapei, Phanagoria, Gorgippia, Theodosia), as well as a small amount of their chorus.

Strengthening of the Mithridatic traditions in the Bosporus in the second half - the end of the 1st century. BC. and in the first half of the 1st c. AD became a kind of reaction to the intensification of Roman policy in the Black Sea region. Gaius Julius Caesar, then Augustus, and later Caligula and Nero, considering the Northern Black Sea region and the Bosporan kingdom as a springboard to counter Parthia and the Sarmatian nomads, sought to either include the region in the system of vassal client states that would entirely follow in the wake of Roman policy, or even reduce his autonomy to a minimum

in preparation for becoming a Roman province. The rulers of the Bosporus - Asander and Dynamis, to a lesser extent Mithridates III, through skillful diplomacy and maneuvers managed to increase their power on the terms of Roman support while maintaining and developing Hellenistic institutions. Asander, who replaced Pharnaces II on the throne, achieved great success in this: as a result of skillful maneuvering during the final period of civil wars in Rome, when the confrontation between Mark Anthony and Octavian reached its climax, he managed to turn the Bosporus state into a typical Hellenistic-type monarchy based on Mithridatic traditions . Under him, Bosporus reached the level of economic development and military power of the era of the reign of Spartokids and Mithridates Eupator, which is confirmed by the abundant minting of full-weight gold coins by Asander. Gold staters, apparently not without subsidies from the Romans, were also issued by Dynamia, Aspurgus, Mithridates III and subsequent rulers, which was impossible if Bosporus was in a severe crisis, as is sometimes believed.

Coin of the time of King Asander. Panticapaeum. 1st century BC.

What is the reason for the economic growth of the Bosporus state in the post-Mithridatic era? Firstly, the philhellenic policy of Mithridates Eupator and his successors in the Bosporus; secondly, the development of polis and royal landownership, along with the rise of handicrafts and trade; thirdly, the Hellenization of the barbarian Sarmatian population, attracted to the processing of the royal choir and the construction of fortresses; fourthly, the assistance of the Roman Empire, which considered the Bosporan kingdom as the most important outpost in the confrontation with the aggressive local tribes - Siraks, Aorses, Alans and Taurus-Scythians. However, the Romans did not immediately realize the importance of the Hellenistic innovations of Mithridates Eupator. At first, following the policy of Pompey and Caesar, they sought to destroy the privileges of the old Mithridatic elite, based on royal landownership of mixed Iranian-Cappadocan and Greek-Sarmatian types. To do this, they tried to put their henchmen Mithridates of Pergamon and Scribonius on the throne. And when this failed, they decided to link the Bosporus with a single union with the recreated in 39 BC. The Pontic kingdom, where the Roman vassal King Polemon I redistributed the land fund and expanded the privileges of the polis nobility, destroying the foundations of the economic power of the Mithridatic elite. Emperor Augustus set him the task of doing the same in the Bosporus, but the local Sarmatian tribes, Greek cities and royal settlers on the chorus put up strong resistance to the Pontic king. The death of Polemon I in 7 BC in the Asian Bosporus marked a turn in Roman politics: Augustus and his successor Tiberius

decided to support the local Mithridatic dynasty and the Greco-Iranian elite, helping them to strengthen the military power of the kingdom. The Romans realized that maintaining a powerful system of military-administrative control of the royal lands based on fortifications and katoikias could become a reliable protection of the interests of the urban trade and craft layer involved in intrapolis trade, including with the cities of the Roman Asia Minor provinces. In Rome, it was considered that the Hellenistic structure of economic and political relations would help protect Roman interests in the Black Sea region, protecting the empire's possessions from unexpected raids by aggressive nomads. The Roman state for a long time strictly followed the balance of power in the Bosporus, maintaining a balance of interests of the Bosporan ruling elite, whose power was based on royal land ownership and exploitation of settled Sarmatian and Meotian tribes, Hellenic layers in cities engaged in trade and handicraft activities, which attracted former nomads to Hellenization, and the tribal aristocracy of the Sarmatians, interested in friendship with the Bosporan rulers and the Romans. Thus, the Roman policy contributed to the development of the Bosporus kingdom as a Hellenistic state, subjectively contributing to the mutual influence and mutual enrichment of the Hellenic and local principles in all areas of the life of this state formation.

The formation of the Hellenistic states in the Black Sea region was carried out in two main ways. In those regions where Mithridatic influence was limited, state formations matured in the depths of tribal communities, so tribal relations retained their significance for a very long time. This hindered the stability of the state system. This was the weakness of the state among the Thracians, the Taurus-Scythians, the Scythians of Dobruja, the Getae and Sarmatians - the Aorsi and Siraks. Even Roman influence did not make it possible to overcome tribal fragmentation, the enrichment of the tribal elite through tributary and robbery of the choirs of cities, the absence of urban centers that participated in the development process industrial relations and productive forces. In the Bosporus and in Pontus, as well as in neighboring states, with all their internal features, other signs were observed: the existence of Greek cities involved in the general Pontic and even Mediterranean trade, royal land ownership, which mediated polis forms of land relations, Greco-Iranian dynastic traditions, around which the Hellenic-Sarmatian and Iranian-Capadocian elite was formed, which became the backbone of the policy of Mithridates Eupator and his successors. The Romans, proceeding from their own interests, supported the prevailing by the 1st century. AD Hellenistic relations in the Bosporus kingdom, which helped to complete the transformation of this state from a tyrannical regime with a slight coloring in the colors of the Hellenistic dynasty to a strong Hellenistic-type monarchy, in miniature repeating the structure of the Pontic state of Mithridates Eupator.

Saprykin S. Yu.

Greek cities of the Black Sea region (the era of archaic and early classics)

In the economic, political, cultural history of the ancient Black Sea region, four main regions are distinguished: Northern, Eastern, Western and Southern, and each had its own characteristics. The earliest ancient Greeks came to the southern shores of the Black Sea, a little later they settled on the left bank of the Pontus. This was due to the routes along which the ancient Greek sailors penetrated the Pont Euxinus and swam in its waters. In those distant times, ships tried to stay on the coast and not go far into the open sea, therefore, leaving the Bosphorus, Greek navigators followed either east along the Anatolian coast towards Paphlagonia and Colchis, or west, towards Thrace, and further north. The direct route across the Black Sea from Cape Karambis in Paphlagonia to Cape Baraniy Lob or Criumetopon on the southern coast of Crimea was mastered by the Greeks only at the beginning of the 4th century. BC e. This circumstance influenced the emergence of the earliest Hellenic colonies precisely in the Western and Southern Black Sea region and only later on the eastern and northern shores. When the first Greek settlements arose in Northern Anatolia, Hellenic shipping began to actively use coastal routes along Paphlagonia and Cappadocia, Pontic and southern regions of Colchis. From there, they more often reached the shores of the North Caucasus and the Eastern Crimea and even swam into the waters of Lake Meotia (Sea of ​​Azov). Therefore, the first Greek settlements in the Bosporus region appeared almost simultaneously with the founding of the Milesian colonies of Phasis and Dioscuria in Colchis. The appearance of Ionian colonists in the North-Western Black Sea region dates back to an earlier time, where, thanks to the coastal route of navigation along Thrace, the Greeks reached the Lower Bug and Lower Dnieper.

The non-simultaneity and diversity of the tasks facing the first colonists of Pontus Euxinus led to the fact that in each of the main zones of Hellenic colonization, internal regions with their own features and characteristics were formed. In the Northern Black Sea region, this is the northwestern part - the Lower Dniester region, the Lower Bug region and the Lower Dnieper region, where from an early time there were Ionian, mainly Milesian, colonies and settlements. In parallel, the Greek colonization of the Cimmerian Bosporus was carried out, where predominantly Ionian settlements grew along the shores of the modern Kerch Strait and only one Aeolian colony, Hermonassa, in the foundation of which the same Ionians took an active part. Even later, at the very end of the VI - the beginning of the V century. BC e., through the efforts of the Ionian settlers in the North-Western and partly Western Pontus, the gradual development of the Western Crimea began, where their settlements and the largest Milesian colony of Kerkinitida appeared in those places. In order to gain a foothold in the southwestern part of the Crimea and keep under supervision the navigation routes from the Western Black Sea region and the mouth of Borisfen to the Bosporus and the Eastern Black Sea region, as well as in the opposite direction - from the coast of the Caucasus to the Bosporus and further west to the left-bank Pontus, it was extremely necessary to establish a colony on Little Chersonese (modern Herakleian Peninsula). However, the Milesians and their colonists did not have time to fully master this region of Taurica. He was subjugated by immigrants from Heraclea Pontus.

This Dorian colony of Megaro-Boeotian origin was founded on the coast of Bithynia in 554 BC. e. and began its colonization activities at the end of the VI century. BC e., when her colony Callatis appeared in the Western Black Sea region. The Heracleots tried to control the trade routes in the Black Sea, trying to connect part of the route they had already mastered from the mouth of the Danube to the western coast of Crimea in order to bypass the Milesian colonies at the mouths of the Dniester, Bug and Dnieper. By the end of the first half - the beginning of the third quarter of the 5th c. BC e. Heraclean merchants and sailors already felt fully prepared to take control of the route of navigation on the high seas between the southern coast of Taurica and the Asia Minor Black Sea coast. This was necessary for the export of products of their rapidly developing wine production, and for their Sinopean neighbors - for the export of olive oil. The development of this route coincided with the expansion of the chora of Heraclea in the east and the penetration of neighboring Sinope to the west and east, so that virtually the entire coast of Anatolia by the middle of the 5th century. BC e. was divided between these two large Black Sea states. Taking advantage of the fact that the Ionians were not able to firmly settle in the region of Lesser Chersonesus (the southern coast of Crimea, due to the mountainous terrain, was poorly suited for founding a full-fledged colony), the Heracleotes and, possibly, the Sinopeans who joined them, in the traditional Dorian manner, forced out the few Ionian settlers from Southwestern, and then from the Northwestern Crimea. In the second half of the 5th c. BC e. in one of the convenient bays of the northeastern part of the Herakleian Peninsula, they founded a colony called Tauric Chersonesus, but at first called Megarik, which became an important stronghold of Dorian traditions and culture in the Northern Black Sea region. As a result of colonization activities on the northern coast of the Black Sea, three large areas Greek influence - the North-Western and North-Eastern Black Sea region, as well as Western Taurica, where the processes of development of polis relations were distinguished by their originality.

Northern Black Sea region

The earliest Greek settlement in the region of the Dniester, Berezan and Dnieper-Bug estuaries, according to the chronicle of Eusebius (Euseb. Chron. = SC I, 3. P. 671), was founded in 647 BC. e. on the island of Berezan (in ancient times it was a peninsula). However, only fragments of ceramics from the end of the 7th century were found there. BC e., and the early cultural layer dates back to the beginning of the 6th century. BC e. The main type of dwellings on the Berezan until the end of the VI century. BC e. dugouts and semi-dugouts remained, the building was chaotic, without planning and division into quarters. The Milesian apoikia on Berezan was originally called "Borisfenida", since the ancient Greeks called the Dnieper River, near the mouth of which their colony arose, Borisfen. Before the founding of Olbia, this settlement was the leading one in the Lower Bug region, as evidenced by the development of new detachments of the Milesian colonists, but with the mediation of their colony Borisfenida, already in the first half - the middle of the 6th century. BC e. the banks of the Berezansky, and then, in the second half of the century, the Bug and Dnieper estuaries. Appeared in the second quarter of the VI century. BC e. on the banks of the Berezansky estuary, rural settlements, mainly dugout and semi-dugout type, belonged to the chora of Borisfenida. At the same time, Olbia arose, and a little earlier, at the beginning of the 6th century. BC e., a craft center on the shores of the Yagorlytsky Bay, which was inhabited by master glassmakers and metal smelters.

The absence at that time on Berezan of traces of town planning, governments, and even places of worship (the earliest traces of cult complexes on the island date back to the second half of the 6th century BC) indicates that the development of this region by the Greeks occurred spontaneously in order to cover as much as possible a wider array of coastal lands. By the time they were settled by the Ionian Greeks, there was virtually no settled agricultural population, so that the settlers freely occupied vast areas. The main core of the colonists were residents of the rural areas of Ionia and western Asia Minor, so the emergence of spontaneous semi-agrarian and agrarian settlements was quite natural. In this regard, some researchers believed that the dugout and semi-dugout buildings of the early settlers could allegedly belong to the barbarians. But archaeological finds have convincingly shown their originally Hellenic character. Apoikia on the Berezan was not a center of crafts and trade, which is eloquently evidenced by the Yagorlyk settlement of artisans that arose separately from the rest, which supplied the surrounding population with handicraft products. Borisfenida-Berezan acquired a regular urban layout towards the end of the 6th century. BC e., therefore, it is not necessary to talk about the polis structure and statehood in the Lower Bug region earlier than this time.

In Olbia, the first colonists appeared no earlier than the second quarter of the 6th century. BC e., and up to the 5th c. BC e. the city did not have a regular layout, a developed urban structure and defensive structures. Olvia, like Berezan, was populated spontaneously and during the first eighty years of its existence resembled a semi-agrarian settlement. By the middle of the VI century. BC e. the network of Greek settlements covered the right bank of the Bug estuary, and by the second half of the century reached the upper reaches of the estuary and spread to its left bank. To date, there are more than 100 settlements of this period in this area, but they did not belong to either the choir of Olbia or the choir of Borisfenida. These were the settlements of the first colonists, and Olbia was only a part of this spontaneously developing settlement structure. Perhaps to early history settlement of the Lower Bug region by the Miletians refers to one of the names of this city - Miletopolis, which reminded the first settlers of their distant homeland - Miletus. And the name "Olvia", which existed until the end of antiquity, the future city received after it began to turn into a cult and political and economic center of this territory. By the end of the second quarter of the 6th c. BC e. there appeared the first sacred site-temenos, where the temples of Apollo the Doctor, one of the patrons of the Milesian colonists, and the Mother of the Gods were located. At the end of the third quarter of the 6th c. BC e. Olbiopolites rebuilt the second Central temenos and the agora, where the main religious building of the future Olbian policy arose - the temple of Apollo Delphinius. At the same time, the area of ​​the city expanded (the remains of structures of the late 6th - early 5th century BC were found in the southern part of the Upper City and in the terraced area), and from the middle of the 6th century. BC e. a network of city streets began to take shape. In the first quarter of the 5th c. BC e. dugout and semi-dugout construction in Olbia gave way to ground structures, although in neighboring Berezan this process began already in the last quarter of the 6th century. BC e.

Approximately the first quarter of the 5th c. BC e. Borysfenida-Berezan and Olvia developed in parallel, since they were just one of the communities in the vast zone of the Milesian colonization of the Lower Bug region. Their influence and significance are evidenced by early coins, the so-called "arrow coins", which appeared as a medium of exchange at the turn of the 7th-6th or at the very beginning of the 6th century. BC e. and were used until the beginning of the 5th century. BC e. There is an assumption that they were released on the island of Berezan. "Arrow coins" imitated the votive to Apollo the Doctor, one of the patrons of the Ionian colonization, whose symbols were bow and arrows. However, they can also be associated with Olbia, where already in the second quarter of the 6th century. BC e. there was a temple of this god. From the third quarter of the 6th c. BC e. in Olbia, the casting of the so-called "dolphins" begins, which circulated until the middle of the 5th century. BC e., including the choir. They were associated with the veneration of Apollo Delphinius after the construction of his temple and agora in the city. The first coins show that the trade exchange in this region took place spontaneously, without supervision and control by the state authorities, and the “arrow coins” themselves were not polis coins. Only after the introduction of Olbian cast "dolphins" with inscriptions in which the names of priests or moneyers are hidden, did some centralization and state regulation of trade exchange begin under the supervision of the city authorities of Olbia. The first cast "dolphins" with legends appeared around the middle - third quarter of the 5th century. BC e., therefore, the registration of state, or rather polis, magistracies took place in the first half of the 5th century. BC e. In this case, the release of "arrows" is a kind of harbinger of the economic and commercial predominance of Olbia in the Lower Bug region already from the end of the second quarter of the 6th century. BC e. Obviously, at that time, and especially from the second half of the century, Borisfenida increasingly fell under the economic and political influence of Olbia as its outpost in the vicinity of the Berezano-Sositsky estuary. At the end of the VI century. BC e. the first generation of descendants of the colonists and new settlers began regular rectangular development of Berezan, and this coincided with the strengthening of neighboring Olbia. Its predominance in the Lower Bug region was marked by the active circulation of “dolphin” coins with the names of the moneyers on Berezan itself and in the settlements that gravitated towards this center.

During the period of stabilization of rural settlements in the region from the second quarter of the 6th century. until the end of the first third of the 5th c. BC e. Olbia gradually rose, located near the mouth of the Bug estuary. It turned into a city-forming polis center, where crafts and trade were concentrated. This was clearly manifested at the end of the first third of the 5th century. BC e., when life is on rural settlements ceased, and their inhabitants moved to Olbia and partly to Berezan. They gradually became centers that could ensure the safety of the inhabitants of the surrounding settlements and give them the rights of a full-fledged polit. In the first half of the 5th c. BC e. in Olbia, defensive walls were built around the entire perimeter of the settlement. In the last quarter of the 6th c. BC e. the settlement of artisans on Yagorlyk fell into decay, and in Olbia itself at the end of the 6th - beginning of the 5th century. BC e. began the production of handicrafts, including to meet the needs of the surrounding Scythian population. Ceramic, woodworking and weaving crafts actively developed in the city, trade with Scythia expanded. As a result, by the beginning of the 5th century. BC e. in the Lower Bug region, urbanization processes intensified, when rural enclaves that had previously arisen spontaneously - settlements of colonists - gradually gave way to more centralized structures that turned into administrative centers. At the same time, the process of forming a city was going on, where handicraft production and trade were carried out, as a result of the separation of handicraft from agriculture (in the Lower Bug region, this was expressed in the transformation of part of the agricultural settlers, inhabitants of dugouts and semi-dugouts of a communal nature, into professional artisans and merchants, as well as builders who moved to Borisphenides and Olvius). The polis nature of the new city-forming centers was initially due to the communal form of settlement of the territory, the creation of spontaneously arisen "bushes" of settlements in the region, which were transformed into one large community. To maintain its viability, a centralized system of state administration was created, which was necessary for the construction and maintenance of defensive walls, the issuance of coins as a means of internal trade exchange, and the maintenance of safe sea and river routes for successful trade with the Scythians.

The transformation of Olbia into a polis state, which was based, among other things, on the influence of Berezan (this is one of the reasons why the Greeks called Olbia Borisfen after the name of Berezan, which may have become its trading harbor), required the centralized management of the chora, since the Greek polis states were based on agricultural production . For its successful functioning, it was necessary to streamline the agrarian district, devastated by the outflow of residents to Olbia and Berezan, who were engaged in trade, crafts, building walls, agora, temples, land dwellings, streets that appeared in the first half of the 5th century BC. BC e. The city more and more resembled a polis center regularly planned according to the Hippodamus system, although it retained elements of the chaotic building characteristic of the traditional community of colonists. This was the reason that by the end of the first quarter of the 5th c. BC e. most of the rural settlements along the banks of the Berezansky and Bug estuaries ceased to exist. However, this process took place gradually: some settlements functioned until the middle - the beginning of the second half of the century as a result of the gradual outflow of the inhabitants of the chora to the city and the gradual reorganization of the rural district.

In another zone of Ionian colonization of the Northwestern Black Sea region - the Lower Dniester region - an almost similar situation has developed. Here, on the left bank of the Dniester estuary, not earlier than the middle, but most likely at the end of the 6th century. BC e. immigrants from Istria founded the city of Nikoniy (Roksolan settlement). At the same time, on the right bank of the estuary, apparently, settlers from Miletus founded Tyra, or Ophiussa, as it was also called, which until the 4th century. BC e. remained a relatively small settlement, perhaps the only one on the right bank of the Dniester Estuary. The settlement of this part of the Dniester region took place through the founding of separate rural settlements or communities of a semi-agrarian type. During the second half of the VI-V century. BC e. about 12 settlements appeared in the vicinity of Nikonia, among which there were quite large ones, for example, Nadlimansky III. Initially, Nikonium, one of the rural-type settlements, by the turn of the 6th-5th centuries. BC e. gradually turned into a polis center with a rural district. At the beginning of the 5th century BC e. its immediate surroundings were divided into sections, which marked the creation of a polis collective and the emergence of a property qualification as an indispensable condition for membership in a civil community. By this time, governing bodies had been formed in Nikonia: the policy received the right to accept proxenia - decrees on granting citizenship to foreigners. We do not know exactly what were the relations between the inhabitants of Nikonium and the rural settlements located at a considerable distance from it. But they clearly constituted a single economic and political space.

The basis of the economy of Nikoniy and other settlements of the Dniester region was agriculture, and the main type of dwellings, as in the Lower Bug region, were semi-dugouts. But from an early time, its inhabitants were engaged in the trade in bread, so Nikonius came to the fore as an intermediary in supplying the agrarian district with handicrafts from the Greek metropolis in exchange for grain. This attracted the local population: at the turn of the VI-V centuries. BC e. in its vicinity, the settlement of Nadlimanskoye VI arose, which could have been founded by settled Scythians interested in selling bread through Nikonium. The development of trade exchange was the reason for the appearance at the beginning of the 5th century. BC e. policy coin. At the same time, in the first half of the 5th c. BC e. in the rural settlements of the left bank of the Dniester region, as in Olbia, life ceased, and the population moved to Nikonium and, obviously, to Tyra. By the middle of the 5th c. BC e. there began stone house-building, in the second half of the 5th century. BC e. dug a moat and erected a fortress wall, and by the 4th century. BC e. brought the urban planning to a regular. So by the beginning of the 5th c. BC e. From a simple agrarian settlement of the first colonists, Nikonius grew into a policy - the center of the entire district, taking into the composition, as happened when the Olbian state was created, most of the inhabitants of nearby settlements.

In Olbia, Borysfen-Berezan and Nikonia, rural "bush" enclaves-oikos were, during the life of about one generation of colonists, a kind of independent communities that did not have the status of a policy. By their nature, they approached the so-called "protopolises" without full-fledged governing bodies, civil rights of residents, property land qualifications and cult civil centers. And only after about 70-80 years, at the beginning of the 5th century. BC e., in these cities, urbanization processes intensified, associated with the development of crafts and trade, the further rise of agriculture, when the land turned into wealth and a means of accumulation. After that, land became the basis of a property qualification as a condition for membership in a civil collective designed to regulate land relations, which went from the spontaneous capture of empty land by the colonists and the creation of self-governing oikos to state regulation of land allotments and retention of surrounding lands. And this brought to life the need for state power, which completed the process of forming a full-fledged policy and institutions of power. A direct consequence of these changes was the widespread destruction of previously independent, spontaneously controlled or not controlled oikos and the redistribution of land. But it took almost half a century, during which the choir of the Greek city-states in the Lower Dniester and Lower Bug regions functioned poorly. The formation of policies in the Lower Dniester region and the Lower Bug region proceeded simultaneously and in stages: it was the path from simple rural settlements-oikos of the first colonists, which arose spontaneously, to a single city-forming settlement - the center of the entire district.

In another region of the Ionian colonization of the Black Sea - the Cimmerian Bosporus - the development of polis relations went in somewhat different ways. The largest Milesian colony on these shores was Panticapaeum - the future capital of the Bosporan state, "the mother of all the Milesian cities of the Bosporus" in the words of the Roman writer of the 4th century. n. e. Ammian Marcellinus (XXI.8.26). Its foundation dates back to the turn of the first or second quarter of the 6th century. BC e. Previously, it was assumed that the first Milesian colonists settled on the slopes of Mount Mithridates, populating what existed here in the 7th-6th centuries. BC e. settlement and founding an emporium for trade with the native population. As a justification for this point of view, they cited the finds of weapons of the Late Bronze Age and the remains of the masonry of some Cyclopean structure under the layer of the 6th century BC. BC e. However, at present, the idea of ​​a local settlement on the site of Panticapaeum has been recognized as untenable, since, as in the Lower Bug region, there was no permanent settled native population there by the arrival of the Greeks, just as there was no alleged emporium. However, upon founding future capital In the Bosporan kingdom, the Milesian colonists nevertheless entered into relations with the Scythians. There are legends that the city was founded by the son of the Colchian king Eet, who received the territory for this from the Scythian king Agaeta (Steph. Byz. s.v. Pantikapaiton). No matter how you treat this message, skeptically or critically, it has a rational grain.

Firstly, it follows from the legend that the colony was brought to Panticapaeum centrally under the leadership of the Oikist, under which the nameless mythical son of King Eet was hiding. After all, Eet, who according to legend ruled in Colchis, and according to the Roman version, over all the Pontic tribes, was associated with the Argonauts, with whose legendary voyage the Hellenic mythological tradition correlated the foundation of many Greek colonies. And the Oikists, the founders of the Greek colonies, strove to appear in the eyes of the settlers as brave and fearless heroes, like those who sailed to Pontus for the Golden Fleece. Subsequently, real events were reworked in Greek novelistic literature into fascinating novels about the role of the Black Sea barbarians in the life of the Hellenes. Secondly, the mention of the Scythian king, who allegedly provided the Greeks with a place to settle, shows that the Scythians, on the eve of the arrival of the Greeks, had influence and even dominated the shores of the Kerch Strait. This is quite consistent with Herodotus' indication of the winter migrations of the Scythians across the ice of the strait from East Taurica to the Asian coast in Sindika (IV. 28). Although there was no Scythian agricultural population in the vicinity of the Milesian apoikia in Panticapaeum, Eastern Taurica fell under the rule of a Scythian leader or king - the leader of one of the clans of the royal Scythian nomads. By the beginning of regular Greek colonization, East Taurica was in their sphere of influence, which left an imprint on relations with the Greeks and for some time served as an obstacle to their appearance. Therefore, the Greeks initially landed not in Panticapaeum and not even on the opposite shore of the strait, but much to the east - on the coast of Meotida in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bmodern Taganrog, where in the third quarter of the 7th century. BC e. a settlement appeared, which was included in science under the name of Taganrog, but in ancient times was called Kremny.

Having appeared in Panticapaeum, the Milesians entered into negotiations with the Scythian king, who allocated land for them to establish a colony. In the early era, Panticapaeum was surrounded by Scythian possessions, therefore, unlike Olbia and Borisfenida, he could not spontaneously populate the territory in the depths of the peninsula, because he experienced a kind of stenochoria, which forced him to develop only a small piece of land on the slopes and at the foot of Mount Mithridates. At the very beginning of the 5th c. BC e. on the acropolis of Panticapaeum, a number of public buildings and a powerful defensive wall appeared, protecting the central part of the city. The existence of an earlier wall could be evidenced by the collapse of large stone blocks in the form of remnants of cyclopean masonry, discovered in 1949 at the Esplanade excavation site, interpreted as backfilling of the city's defensive wall, but this interpretation is currently disputed. Be that as it may, the appearance by the end of the VI - the beginning of the V century. BC e. ground houses, including multi-chamber ones, a monumental building - a tholos with a plot and a system of premises around it, the formation of streets and urban planning indicate that by this time Panticapaeum had become a typical Greek policy.

At the turn of the first-second quarter of the VI century. BC e. on the opposite shore of the gulf, another Milesian colony, Myrmekius, arose. Like the inhabitants of the early Panticapaeum, the first settlers there first lived in dugouts. After a strong fire, apparently caused by the attack of the Scythians in the middle of the VI century. BC e., approximately in the third quarter of this century, they surrounded their settlement with a rather powerful stone defensive wall, although the transition to stone house-building took place there only at the beginning of the 5th century. BC e. A little north of Myrmekia, near the modern ferry crossing to Taman, Porfmiy and another small town of Partheny were founded. For a long time it was assumed that Porfmiy arose no earlier than the end of the 6th century. BC e. Remains of a defensive wall discovered not so long ago, erected no later than the second half of the 6th century BC. BC e., moreover, in a technique similar to that of Myrmek, they make the date of the foundation of the city older than the first half of the century. Such an early appearance of these cities excludes the possibility of bringing colonies there from Panticapaeum. Obviously, as in the settlement of the Lower Bug region, the colonists from Miletus settled on rather large sections of the coast of the strait. But if in the North-Western Black Sea region the foundation of early settlements occurred spontaneously, as if by "bushes" - oikos, then apoikias were brought to Eastern Taurica centrally and acquired defensive walls quite early.

South of Panticapaeum on the site of modern. the village of Arshintsevo around the middle of the 6th century. BC e. Tiritaka was founded. In the western part of this city, the remains of two stone buildings of the second half of the 6th century were discovered. BC e., although the defensive wall appeared at the beginning of the 5th century. BC e. after the fire and destruction. The early appearance of stone houses, unlike other policies, could be the result of the rapid transformation of apoikia into a policy. In the 580-560s. BC e. Samos settlers brought a colony to Nymphaeum, where the local, apparently Scythian population lived before them and there was one of the crossings to the Asian side of the strait. It could be part of the Scythians who came with the nomads to cross to the opposite side of the Bosporus, who preferred to stay in Eastern Taurica to engage in agriculture. Therefore, Nymphaeum maintained good relations with the surrounding population over the next two centuries. Initially, the Greek settlement there was traditionally of a semi-agrarian type, dugouts and semi-dugouts served as dwellings, and the transition to stone construction was outlined only in the middle - second half of the 6th century. BC e., when the first temples appeared and by the end of the century the polis structure began to form.

At the beginning of the VI century. BC e. on the Asian side of the Bosporus, the Milesian colonists founded Kepy (the present-day village of Sennaya), and in the second quarter of this century, the Aeolian settlers, together with the Ionians, founded Hermonassa (the present-day village of Taman). There are very few construction remains of the archaic era in this city: these are mainly fillings of pits, obviously, the remains of buildings in the form of dugouts and semi-dugouts. The foundations of raw masonry can be traced only from the middle - the second half of the 6th century. BC e., which makes it possible to talk about the gradual transition of apoikia to urban life. Traces of a fire (pieces of coal, ash, burnt raw material) were recorded in the layers of this time. The beginning of monumental construction dates back to the end of the 6th - beginning of the 5th century. BC e., when the first pavement appears, and hence the formation of streets. In Kepi, traces of a great fire that occurred around the middle of the 6th century are clearly visible. BC e., after which, in the third quarter of the century, restructuring and leveling work began. At the settlement of Patrei, which arose around the middle of the 6th century. BC e., early defensive structures date back to the second half of the century, and later 512 BC. e. the city was also on fire.

Archaeological excavations show that soon after the appearance of Myrmekius, Porfmiy, Kepa, Hermonassa and, probably, Patreus, were attacked by the Scythians, who moved from the Caucasus to the Cimmerian Bosporus. As a result, they entered a period of decline, and the Taganrog settlement ceased to exist altogether. And only after that they began to turn into small towns with a characteristic infrastructure (walls, fortification, ground construction, streets) and collective forms of public life (temples, public buildings). Scythian attacks did not affect Panticapaeum and Nymphaeum, in any case, traces of fires there during the 6th century. BC e. not tracked. Indeed, when they were founded, the colonists entered into close relations with the Scythians and, probably, concluded agreements with them on the provision of territory for the city, which protected them from the attack of nomads. And the Ionian colonists who founded Myrmekia, Kepy, Porfmiy, did not conclude such agreements and did not fix the delimitation of possessions with the Scythians, for which they suffered from raids. As a result, Nymphaeum and especially Panticapaeum during the VI century. BC e. received great opportunities for development, which led to the early transformation of apoikias into cities and the creation of a polis structure. This was facilitated by the influx of population from the cities and settlements that suffered from the Scythian attacks, because, fearing new invasions of the steppes, the descendants of the first settlers found refuge in Panticapaeum and, apparently, Nymphea, loyal to the Scythians. And this accelerated the development of polis relations, demanded new land holdings, turned these cities into centers of crafts and trade, elevated them politically and contributed to the growth of well-being - and gradually deepened property inequality. Therefore, urban processes and the development of polis relations proceeded there more intensively than in other places, turning Panticapaeum into the leading policy of the region, and Nymphaeum into its no less strong rival. Already in the second half of the VI century. BC e. metallurgical workshops arose in Panticapaeum, in particular, the so-called "metallurgist's house", where the remains of foundry molds and slags were found, pottery, stone-cutting, weapons workshops. When it was formed into an urban center with a developed craft and trade, then in the 530-520s. BC e. the first coins appeared, which, before the advent of other polis coins, were almost the only means of payment on both sides of the strait. The rapid development of Panticapaeum and the enrichment of some of its inhabitants led to an internal political struggle that ended in 480. BC e. establishing tyranny. As a result, Panticapaeum began to expand the agricultural base and strengthen the chorus, as a result of which a number of cities on the Kerch Peninsula (Myrmekiy, Zenon Chersonese, Porfmiy, Partheny, Tiritaka) fell under the rule of Panticapaeum tyrants. In parallel, the agricultural possessions of Nymphaeum and Theodosius, as well as policies on the Asian side of the strait, increased.

The main difference between the polis forms of life among the Miletians in the North-Western Black Sea region and in the Bosporus was as follows. In the Lower Dniester and Lower Bug region, the Ionian first settlements - oikos - gradually united into single urban centers Nikony and Olbia in peaceful conditions in order to create a centralized administrative administration to ensure the security of the new community - the policy and its citizens, the arrangement of the chora, support for agriculture, crafts and trade , including export. In the Bosporus, according to the ancient written tradition represented by Hecateus of Miletus, where most of the cities are called policies, the development of the region during colonization was more centralized. Here, as a result of the Scythian danger, which was not so clearly manifested in Olbia in the 6th century. BC e., apoikias quickly turned into cities - centers of crafts and trade, and at an accelerated pace formed into policies, corporate forms of social organization characteristic of Hellenic culture. In addition, in contrast to the North-Western Pontus, where only Milesian settlers were present, colonies of other Greek centers existed in the Cimmerian Bosporus, in particular, Mytilene on Lesbos and Samos. This prevented the merging of early settlements into a single center and the formation of a group of settlements around it, through which it would be possible to control the district. And although the Scythian raid, which destroyed Kremnae and devastated Myrmekiy, Porfmiy, Kepa, Hermonassa and Patrei, led to the rise of Panticapaeum and Nymphaeum, urban processes during the VI century. BC e. affected every Bosporan policy, preventing the creation of a single policy association, similar to the one that developed in Olbia and Berezan. Therefore, in the Bosporus in the second half of the VI century. BC e. Panticapaeum, Nymphaeum, Kepy, Germonassa became full-fledged policies, and a little later, at the turn of the 6th-5th centuries. BC e., founded in the second half of the VI century. BC e. Phanagoria and Theodosius. In Myrmekia, Patrea, Porfmia and Tiritaka, a full-fledged polis organization was not created, which led to the loss of their independence.

Western Black Sea

In the middle - third quarter of the 7th century. BC e. (657 BC) colonists from Miletus founded Istria in the Danube Delta. It was the largest colony of Ionians in the region, which from an early time established ties with the local tribes of the Getae, who lived in most of Dobruja, bounded by the Balkan Mountains and the Moldavian Upland. From ancient times, the Getae were engaged in settled agriculture, which allowed them to sell surplus agricultural products to the Ionian settlers. Trade with them was carried out along the Danube and tributaries. However, the area where Istria was founded did not belong to the Getae, which allowed the Greeks to develop the surrounding lands and create their own chorus. It is not known whether Istria was founded spontaneously, like Olbia and Berezan, or whether the colony was still centralized. Probably, this was still done in a more organized manner than in the Lower Bug region, and at first Istria was one of the usual Milesian settlements of a semi-agrarian nature. Other Greek settlements in its vicinity and at the mouth of the Danube are already attested at the end of the 7th - beginning of the 6th century. BC e. One of them - Cap Doloshman - was located 20 km from Istria, the settlements of Tariverda, Nuntashi I and II appeared in the second quarter of the 6th century. BC e. and were located at a distance of 12-18 km from it. In the middle of the VI century. BC e. at the mouth of the Danube, urban-type settlements of Vishina and Sarinasuf arose, and the settlement of Nuntashi generally had a regular layout. Toward the end of the VI century. BC e. rural estates began to appear near Istria, such as the Istria-Pod estate, 4 km from the city. Their population from an early time was mixed, since Greeks and Geto-Thracians lived there.

The development of the rural district of Istria began at the turn of the 7th-6th centuries. BC e. and continued throughout the sixth century. BC e. Some of the settlements in this area, such as, for example, the policy of Orgalema, mentioned by Hecateus of Miletus (Nec. fr. 152 = Steph. Byz. s.v.), were founded as a result of direct colonization from Miletus in the second half - the end of the 7th century BC. BC e. Others could have arisen as a result of internal colonization from Istria, when it turned into the leading center of the region and began to develop the surroundings, and then even brought a number of colonies to the Northwestern Black Sea coast - Nikony, Istrian Harbor, Isiakov Harbor, etc. The settlements closest to Istria were drawn into the process of the formation of the policy and choras, and it was then that the Getae began to settle near them. These settlements gradually turned into a stronghold of Istrian influence at the mouth of the Danube. And when at the end of the VI century. BC e. the distant approaches to the city were taken under control by the Istrians, the development of nearby lands began, where the estates of citizens of the policy that had already developed by that time, which had become the main center of trade and handicraft activities in the entire district, were built. Settling on the land of the local farmers-Geta was a direct consequence of their participation in the exchange of goods with Istria. Greek imports began to appear in the settlements of the local population in the 6th century. BC e., ceramic production, which was under a very strong Istrian influence, also developed at this time, and by the 5th century. BC e. Istrian coins began to be widely distributed. The emergence of settled Getic communities in the Danube region led to the creation of a semi-dependent agricultural population, which ancient sources call "Istrians". As in the Lower Dniester region, local settlements here coexisted with Greek ones, and in some places their population was generally mixed.

The earliest Milesian colony in Thrace is Apollonia Pontic (modern city of Sozopol), which was founded at the end of the 7th century. BC e. One of the leaders of its colonists was the philosopher Aristagoras of Miletus. Almost simultaneously, Ionian settlements appeared in the vicinity of Sozopol - Avluteikhos and Agatopol, of which the first, judging by the name, was a Thracian settlement before the arrival of the Greeks. At the end of the VI century. BC e. Dorian colonists settled Mesembria (modern city of Nessebar), where before their arrival there was also a Thracian settlement. At the beginning of the VI century. BC e. Ionian colonists from Miletus settled in Odessa (modern city of Varna) and Tomy (modern city of Constanta). In the VI century. BC e. Miletians organized a colony in Callatis, located in the Romanian Dobruja, which subsequently, obviously, at the end of the 6th century. BC e., was recolonized by the Dorian Greeks from Heraclea Pontica. Obviously, most of the Milesian apoikias on the Thracian coast of the Black Sea were founded centrally, and not spontaneously - by “bushes” of oikos, which was observed in the Lower Bug region. But so far, this can only be said speculatively. Obviously, already from an early time there were prerequisites for the transformation of apoikias into policies. One of the reasons for this was the existence of settled Thracian settlements in the south and northeast of Thrace and in Dobruja, for example, Urdoviza, and even cities, especially on the coast. Among them is the Thracian settlement of the urban type Bria, where Messembria was founded (Bria - "city", "fortress" > Messembria, Poltim-bria, Selimbria). Due to the overabundance of the population, including the inclusion of the Thracians in the population of cities, the internal processes of development of the policies of the Left-bank Pontus during the VI century. BC e. led to the need for secondary colonization and development of the entire coast of Thrace. In the 5th century BC e. Greeks settled in the Thracian town of Bizia (Kavarna), and no later than the middle of the 5th century. BC e. founded Kruny-Dionysopol. The emergence of these "secondary" colonies, apparently, is the result of the fact that in Apollonia Pontic, Tomy, Odessa, possibly in Mesembria by the middle of the 5th century. BC e. completed the formation of polis institutions and choirs. However, most of the territory in the vicinity of the Greek cities belonged to the Thracians, so their chora could not expand significantly, which forced them to create new settlements on the coast. In one of the inscriptions of the 1st c. BC e. from Dionisopolis on drawing the boundaries between the lands of the Thracian king Kotis and the policies of Odessa and Callatis, it is said that they were agreed visually on the spot and in accordance with some “ancient acts” on the “ancient borders” of Callatis and Dionysopol (IGBulg V. 5011). These documents apparently go back to the time of the creation of the choir of Dionisopolis shortly after its foundation, and the participation in the act of their confirmation of the representatives of the Thracian king shows that this was an agreement between the Thracians and the Greeks on the boundaries of their possessions. Similar agreements on the size of the choras of the Greek city-states in Thrace were concluded with other cities, so that the limits of the agricultural territories of the city-states could be limited by the possessions of neighboring barbarian states.

Southern Black Sea

The most ancient Greek city in this region was Sinope, located on the Inzheburun peninsula in Paphlagonia. In Greek sources, mainly in the pseudo-Scymnos periplus and Plutarch, it is said that it received its name from one of the Amazons, and then it was inhabited by the Leuco-Syrs, that is, the Cappadocians, inhabitants of Eastern Anatolia. They were expelled by Autolycus and his companions Phlogius and Deileon, the Thessalians from the city of Tricka. Then, according to one version of the myth about the Argonauts, they left, and the Milesian Habron (or Habronda), who died during the invasion of the Cimmerians, brought a colony there. After the Cimmerians moved to Asia, the Milesian exiles Koy and Kretin brought a colony to Sinop, who “restored” (or “repopulated” the city - συνοικίζουσι, which literally means “gathered in one place the population dispersed after the Cimmerian plunder”).

In modern scientific literature, these messages have received an ambiguous interpretation, but the main thing in them is that the arrival of immigrants from Thessaly to Sinop is considered either a mythological fiction or a real fact, and dates back to the end of the 2nd millennium BC. e. The settlement of Khabron and the withdrawal of the colony by the Oikists-Miletians Koy and Kretin are unambiguously interpreted as real events that do not deviate too much from each other in time. The arrival of Habron is attributed to 725-700. BC e. or a little later - by 696-676. BC e. (just before the fall of Phrygia as a result of the invasion of the Cimmerians and their arrival in Lydia in the 670-660s BC), and the resettlement of the colonists, led by Coy and Cretin, by 632/631 BC. e. The skepticism about the stay of Autolycus in Sinope is hardly justified, since in the context of the note of pseudo-Skimnos it is directly combined with the settlement of the city by the Milesians, which is recognized as real. In addition, neither Habron, nor Coy and Cretinus were revered by the Sinopeans as the founders of their city, but Autolycus and his companion Phlogius. The Thessalian colonization of the southern and northeastern Black Sea region is now an established fact, so Autolycus, Phlogius and Deileont arrived in Sinop, probably shortly before the settlement of Khabron there, i.e. in the second half of the 8th century. BC e.

Greeks appeared in Sinop whenever barbarians were there - first the Cappadocians (or, perhaps, the descendants of the Assyrian trading colonists in Cappadocia), then the Cimmerians. The latter, as Herodotus says, generally “founded a city on the peninsula on which Sinop is now located” (Herod. IV. 12). In fact, the Cimmerian nomads hardly founded any cities, so the Apoiks, led by Kretin and Koi, arrived in Sinop when there was a Cimmerian camp or temporary camp, and the earlier Greek population of the "Ktisma of Khabron" either dispersed around the surroundings or lived in the nearest Paphlagonian villages. So the new Milesian Oikists had to collect them in one place - in Sinop. This means that at first Autolycus (if his colony is real), then Khabron, and in particular Cretin and Koi settled Sinop centrally, and not spontaneously. And the Thessalians of Autolycus generally did it with the help of military force. The transformation of apoikia into a polis began no earlier than the arrival of the Milesians under the leadership of Coy and Cretinus, that is, at the end of the 7th - beginning of the 6th centuries. BC e. So the real foundation of Sinope, after which it became a polis, occurred almost simultaneously with the appearance of the Milesian colonists in Apollonia Pontus, Istria, Borisfen.

The centralized eviction of the Milesians to Sinop created the prerequisites for the transformation of the colony into a policy, which became the center of crafts and trade. Their close neighbors, the Paphlagonians, were at the stage of the decomposition of the tribal system and the transition to the state, in the vicinity of the city there were rich ore deposits and traditions of metal smelting - copper and iron - were formed, which accelerated the development of the urban economy. The local nobility was extremely interested in trade with the Greeks, therefore, no later than the 6th - beginning of the 5th century. BC e. the Sinopeans got the opportunity to create their own chorus - first in the immediate vicinity of the city, and then to the east and west along the coast. In the east, they founded Trebizond and Kerasunt in the country of the Colchians, Kotiora in the country of the Tibarens, Hermonassa and Karusa, which made it possible to take control of almost the entire coastline in the southeastern part of the Black Sea region. In the west, the presence of Sinop was marked by such cities as Armena, Kitor, Sezam, Kromny, possibly Abonuteih, although the exact date of their occurrence has not been established. It is possible that the Sinop settlers settled where the Milesians, their forefathers, settled earlier. But this happened no later than the middle of the 5th century. BC e., as confirmed by the mention of some of them at the turn of the 5th-4th centuries. BC e. in Xenophon's Anabasis. According to his report, Kotiora was taken from the local population by force (Xen. Anab. V. 5. 10), then the Kotiriots, as well as the inhabitants of Kerasunt and Trebizont, began to pay tribute to the Sinopeans, contributing to the development of their material production and trade. Greek tradition calls Trebizond the most ancient colony of Sinop, bred as early as 750 BC. e. But this has long been considered unrealistic, and the appearance of the Greeks in Trebizond not earlier than the 6th century is recognized as a historical fact. BC e., so that the foundation of other settlements in this area is unlikely to have preceded the eviction of the Sinopeans to Trebizond. In each of these settlements there were special governors of the city authorities of Sinop - harmosts, who monitored the payment of tribute to the city. Most of it was paid to the Sinop colonists by local agricultural tribes, so the Sinop colonies in the South-Eastern and Southern Black Sea coast were withdrawn not so much to expand the choras of their metropolis, but to establish peaceful good-neighborly relations with the surrounding tribes in order to receive surplus agricultural products. Therefore, in the middle - the second half of the VI century. BC e. Sinop became a classic policy with its own governing bodies, an agrarian district in the immediate vicinity and a chain of settlements in the distant khor, which helped to keep the subject territory and maintain relations with local tribes. These lands, very remote from the policy, were not cultivated by Sinop colonists, but were used to withdraw tribute from local communal farmers and conduct trade, which was achieved on a mutually beneficial basis. Part of the local settled farmers was subordinated military force, as in Kotiora, and the other voluntarily recognized the protectorate of the Greeks. Some tribes, for example, the highlanders in the district of Trebizond, were nevertheless hostile to the Greeks, and this inevitably united the latter, in some cases leading to the creation of centralized polis collectives. Therefore, Trebizond quickly became a city, which at one time even minted a coin.

After establishing colonies on the coast as far as Colchis, Sinope became the main exporter of olive oil, which required a lot of amphorae to transport. To do this, the policy actively developed ceramic production, including in the choir near the city walls, where ceramic kilns were excavated. This testifies to peaceful relations with the Paphlagonians, Tibarens, Colchians, Khalibs, which were established among the Sinop colonists. On the one hand, this contributed to an increase in the length of the chora, but on the other hand, it prevented its serious expansion in many of the cities subject to Sinop. Therefore, unlike Sinope itself, the first polis coins of which appeared in 490 BC. e., coinage in its colonies was carried out sporadically and not earlier than the 4th century. BC e.

The relatively late appearance of the polis coin is not an argument against the completion of the formation of the polis in Sinop by the second half of the 6th century. BC e., when the city began an active colonization policy. Indeed, among the local tribes with whom the Sinopeans maintained trade, until the 6th-5th centuries. BC e. exchange in kind prevailed, and weapons and bronze axes were used as an equivalent of value. In addition, in Colchis, where the Sinop influence was quite strong, local coins began to spread from the end of the 6th century. BC e. Therefore, as soon as in Sinop, due to the exploitation of the colonies, domestic market and the city turned into a center of export trade, there were prerequisites for issuing coins.

The second most important city in the Southern Black Sea region - Amis (modern city of Samsun) - was founded by the Greeks in the place from where the overland trade route led into the depths of the mainland. It connected the coast with the inner regions of Eastern Anatolia and the adjacent regions of Mesopotamia. Here was the trade route to the east Central Asia, and Amis lay at the crossroads of these paths. The founders of the city were the Milesians and Phocians. Archaeological finds dating back to the early era come mainly from its environs - from the Ak-Alan hill, 18 km from the city. The architectural terracottas found here have a distinct Phocaean influence, so there is an assumption that the first colonists from Phocaea occupied this hill for their subsequent consolidation in the region. It is now established that at the very beginning of the VI century. or even at the end of the seventh century. BC e. in these places, colonists from Miletus appeared to trade with the local population of Eastern Anatolia. Soon, in the first half of the VI century. BC e., the Ionian settlement was captured by the Cappadocians, led by King Timod. Not earlier than the middle of this century, the Phocians landed in Amis, who, together with the Cappadocians, fortified the city, surrounding it with defensive walls. The early layers of the settlement provide material from the 6th-5th centuries. BC e., among which fragments of Eastern Greek painted dishes, amphoras of the Eastern Mediterranean centers, and tiles predominate. Consequently, Amis, as a center of crafts and trade, actively developed from the second quarter - the middle of the 6th century. BC e., and as a policy - from the beginning of the second half of the century.

The rival of Sinope and Amis in the Southern Black Sea region was the Pontic Heraclea (modern city of Eregli), founded by the Megarian and Beoto-Thessalian settlers, led by the Oikist Megarian Gnesiokh, who arrived in the settlement already mastered by the Milesians. What this Milesian colony was like and what it was called is unknown. According to ancient literary tradition, the first Ionian settlers entered into some kind of relationship with the local tribes of the Mariandines, who were engaged in settled agriculture and obeyed rulers who resembled tribal leaders. Given the general practice of establishing early Milesian colonies, it can be assumed that the Ionians appeared in Heraclea at the beginning of the 6th century. BC e., and at first their settlement was small, and its inhabitants received agricultural products from the surrounding Mariandinsky villages. The information from the sources that the Milesian colonists were the first to subjugate the Mariandines is incorrect, since the Greek authors simply transferred the situation that developed after the Dorian colonization to the relations that were established between the Mariandines and the first colonists of Heraclea - the Milesians. And they were clearly good-neighbourly, which is evidenced in the legendary Greek-Mariandinian tradition and the myth of the Argonauts, and which is indirectly confirmed by the general and generally peaceful Ionian practice of establishing colonies in the Black Sea region.

The weakness of the first Milesian apoikia in Heraclea, perhaps even the oikos or "bush" nature of its settlement, and therefore the lack of a proper settlement as a real polis, contributed to the active penetration of the Megarian Dorians there. According to their traditional policy of forcible seizure of already inhabited places, the Megaro-Boeotian colonists simply drove the Milesians out of Heraclea. Having entered into an agreement with the Mariandinsky king, they received land at the mouth of the river. A face for the foundation of his apoikia. This was achieved by forcibly and centrally infiltrating colonists into Mariandinia. This process was reflected in local legends, according to which Hercules, the patron of the Dorians and the eponymous hero-founder of their colony, subjugated the surrounding tribes. Obviously, the Milesians could not help the Mariandines in the wars with neighboring tribes, and the Dorian Greeks took on this responsibility, for which they received territory from the Mariandines for arranging apoikia. The centralized nature of the removal of the colony to Heraclea by the Megarians contributed to the development of the policy at an accelerated pace, and by the end of the 6th century. BC e. forms of the Dorian civil community took shape there, the internal political struggle intensified and conditions appeared for the establishment of an oligarchic and tyrannical system. However, the growth of the rural district was limited by the agreement with the Mariandines, which prevented its expansion. This led to the enrichment of a small group of residents of the policy and at the same time forced another part of it, deprived of their livelihood, exhausted by internal contradictions and internal political struggles, to leave the city and move to Callatis, and later to Tauric Chersonesus. At their founding, the Heracleots-Dorians resorted to the same practice, which helped them earlier to oust the first Ionian settlers from their homes and gain a foothold in Heraclea.

Eastern Black Sea

Having mastered the southern coast of the Black Sea, the Greeks began to penetrate into the Eastern Black Sea region, mainly to Colchis. They appeared in this region in the middle - the second half of the VI century. BC e., since the earliest Ionian pottery in the Eastern Black Sea region dates back to the second quarter of the 6th century. BC e. The penetration of the Greeks into Colchis, as in other places, is associated with the colonization activities of Miletus, but with a large participation of people from Sinope, especially after the founding of Trebizond. In the country of the Colchians, the Greeks founded several cities - Phasis, Dioscuria, Gienos, as well as settlements unknown by name in Esheri and Pichvnari, possibly in Vani. It is rather difficult to study the development of Greek colonies in Colchis and the ways of their transformation into policies: large settlements are practically not excavated there; Phasis, the city best known from the description of the sources, has not yet been found, apparently, it is flooded by the sea and the discharges of the river Rioni (ancient Phasis); most of Dioscuria (modern city of Sukhumi) was swallowed up by the sea and built up with a modern city; in Pichvnari, only the Greek burial ground and local Colchian monuments were studied. More or less regular excavations were carried out only in Gienos and Esheri, as well as in the vicinity of Batumi, where the city of Petra was located in the area of ​​the Batumi fortress.

There are two completely opposite points of view on the development of Greek cities in Colchis. According to one of them, in the VI-II centuries. BC e. Colchis was a powerful state, so the ruling Colchian nobility was interested in the stay of the Hellenes. She sought to obtain handicrafts from them and benefit from trade with the Mediterranean. Therefore, the Greek settlements in Colchis were emporia - trading posts or colonies, which, with a few exceptions, failed to develop into full-fledged city-states of the polis type. According to another point of view, in the Greek apoikias from the very beginning there were preconditions for a rapid transformation into policies. But due to the specific natural conditions in Colchis, primarily the climate and swampy coast, they were weak, which led to an early termination of their functioning.

Both of these concepts are highly controversial. At present, the emporial stage of the Greek colonization of the Black Sea region has been completely rejected. In addition, Colchis was never a powerful state and constantly lived in conditions of half-life into separate almost independent regions-skeptuchia, ruled by their rulers. The state was an early class state with remnants of the primitive communal system, no different from other barbarian state formations of the Black Sea region, in particular, the Thracian kingdom of the Odryses, which was more of a tribal union than a powerful state with a strong sole power of the king. And the decline of polis life is not connected with the climate, but with the development of the chorus of Dioscuria and Phasis and the conquest of Colchis by Mithridates Eupator.

The first Hellenic settlers appeared at the mouth of the Rioni River, where Phasis is believed to have been founded under the Oikist Themistagoras of Miletus. The mythical leader of the colonists was also considered the god Apollo, who had the epicles "Hegemon", which implies the centralized nature of colonization. This epikles is known from an inscription on a silver bowl found in a burial mound near st. Zubovskaya in the Kuban. Obviously, before the removal of the colony, the Greeks received an oracle in Delphi, or rather in Didyma, where the pan-Greek sanctuaries of Apollo, one of the patrons of the Milesian colonists of Pontus, were located. Heraclid Lemb, Greek philosopher and writer of the 2nd century BC. BC e., who compiled Aristotle's Politius - writings that have not come down to us about the socio-political system of various Greek policies, preserved evidence from the "polity of the Fasians" that Phasis enjoyed self-government and even provided good deeds to sailors in distress near its shores, as opposed to genioham, a local tribe distinguished by barbarism and savagery (SC I, 2. R. 447). Geniokhs (some believe that other tribes were meant here, since the geniokhs lived higher) were engaged in piracy and robbed the Hellenic sailors. As soon as the Miletians settled at the mouth of the Rioni, they, unlike the locals, began to provide services to the shipwrecked and foreigners who came to them. "Services to foreigners" could imply the issuance of decrees on proxies, which means the existence of polis institutions of power in Phasis. Therefore, it can be assumed that the barbarians lost control over the coast, as they were driven out of it by the inhabitants of the newly founded colony. Consequently, the Ionian pioneers quickly began to develop the surrounding area in order to achieve the possession of the chorus. In Phasis, from the last quarter of the 6th c. BC e. coins were minted - "Colchis", which was the result of its transformation into a center of crafts and trade with the local Colchian population. This happened already during the lifetime of the first generation of Hellenic settlers. However, "Colchis" coins are anepigraphic (without a legend) and were not the monetary sign of the polis community.

Almost simultaneously with the appearance of the Milesian colonists in Colchis, already in the VI century. BC e., along the river. Fortified settlements populated by the Colchians arose in the Rioni and other rivers. It is possible that Phasis gained influence within the country shortly after its emergence. The inhabitants of these settlements could supply the Greeks with agricultural products, wood, leather, metal, like their fellow tribesmen in the vicinity of Trebizond. Fortified settlements could serve as protection of the Colchian tribal possessions from excessive Greek expansion, although the relations between the Fasians and the Colchians were peaceful, mutually beneficial, but at the same time wary, which was in the interests of the local nobility. Trade exchange, the development of crafts attracted a settled local population in the vicinity of the Greek city, who received the opportunity to run their own economy. With the expansion of the district of the policy (and the fact that Phasis was a policy is evidenced by the “politia of the Fasians”), part of the settled population turned into inhabitants of a distant chora, who, continuing to live in the villages, became semi-dependent and incomplete community members.

An example of peaceful relations between the Greek colonists and the Colchians is the ancient settlement of Pichvnari (10 km from Kobuleti), where by the arrival of the Greeks already in the 6th century. BC e. Colchian settlements existed. Excavations of the Greek and Colchian necropolises, where there are no burials with weapons, show that the relationship between the Hellenic and Colchian populations was built on a peaceful and mutually beneficial basis. Perhaps the Greeks settled in a special quarter on the Colchian settlement or in a separate village located nearby. After all, the Colchian and Hellenic burial grounds were arranged separately from each other. Following the example of the Milesian colonization of the Western and North-Western Black Sea coast, it can be assumed that during the colonization of Western Colchis, the so-called oikos or “bush” principle of settling the territory, in this case, the vicinity of Pichvnari, again appeared. One of these Greek settlements was, as it were, implanted into one or several Colchian settlements.

The largest Hellenic settlement in Colchis was Dioscuria. Legends connect it with the mythical heroes Castor and Pollux (or Pollux), the Dioscuri brothers, who became the eponymous founders of the city. The city arose in the early era, when the Ionian sailors discovered Colchis, which was reflected in the myth of the voyage of the Argo ship. Late archaic finds in Dioscuria are rare, but exploration in its vicinity has attested to 10 native settlements of the 6th-5th centuries. BC e. According to the Greek geographer Strabo, from 70 to 300 different nationalities gathered in the city and its surroundings (XI. 2. 16), since from an early time he carried on extensive trade with neighboring barbarians. This testifies to the relatively rapid transformation of Dioscuria into an important center of crafts and trade, almost the only city in Colchis, which by the IV-III centuries. BC e. owned an extensive choir and at the turn of II-I centuries. BC e. issued a coin with its own name. Consequently, Dioscuria can be attributed to typical Hellenic policies, which cannot be said about other Greek cities in the region (in relation to Phasis, this can only be assumed).

The beginning of the formation of the choir of Dioscuria can be dated to the second half of the 6th century. BC e. Unlike Pichvnari and Fasis, in the burial grounds of the local population, which lived in the vicinity of Dioscuria, from the 8th-6th centuries. BC e. there are quite a few burials with weapons, and Greek imported items appear in the burial grounds of the native population no earlier than the 6th century BC. BC e. Obviously, the expansion of the rural district of the policy took place in a non-peaceful way. This is evidenced by the discovery of a fragment of a Greek shield in the necropolis of the Krasnomayatsky settlement near Sukhumi, as well as the discovery of Greek helmets in the surrounding settlements and in the burial grounds. It is possible that the Esher settlement (10 km from Sukhumi), which arose in the middle of the 6th century. BC e., in the V - the first half of the IV century. BC e., when its territory increased, it became part of the growing choir of Dioscuria. Fortified settlements and border fortifications on the chorus allowed the policy to keep the local population in obedience. The existence of a polis community in Dioscuria and the presence of a chora are also confirmed by ceramic stamps on amphoras with the name of the city. Their production was established not only in the city, but also in the rural district - 15 km northwest of Sukhumi between Esheri and New Athos. There was a pottery workshop, whose products, mainly amphorae, were used to bottle wine from grapes grown in the countryside of the policy. Part of the amphoras could come to the rural periphery from the city.

Colchian villages were located on the hills closest to Dioscuria, but what relations their inhabitants had with the Greeks is not entirely clear. The burial grounds of these settlements date back to the 5th-2nd centuries. BC e., and the finds of coins, including the "Colchis", in some of them seem to speak of trade and economic ties. The development of the choir of Dioscuria began no later than the 5th century. BC e., and to the IV-III centuries. BC e. she reached largest sizes. Consequently, from the very beginning, Dioscuria was settled in a centralized manner, despite the fact that the polis forms of its state structure had developed by the 5th-4th centuries. BC e. And the local population in its vicinity, especially in the villages, turned into subservient semi-dependent or dependent farmers, forced to supply the polis community with the products of their labor. It was not engaged in trade, since it was mainly the tribes that lived above Dioscuria, her immediate neighbors, who were drawn into it. This city was their common trading center, where their representatives came to conclude trade deals.

However, by the III-II centuries. BC e. in some necropolises, for example, in the area of ​​the Krasnomayatsky settlement, the number of burials decreased as a result of the relocation of part of the inhabitants of the chora to the policy in connection with urban processes or a partial reduction in the chora and agricultural production. After the entry of Colchis into the Pontic kingdom at the end of the 2nd century. BC e. King Mithridates Eupator allowed Dioscuria to mint coins, which secured the city's polis status. But according to the Pontic domestic policy, the creation of policies was determined by the royal ownership of land and the formation of royal lands, while maintaining an insignificant amount of the former polis holdings. Therefore, the decay of cities in Colchis and their decline by the end of the 2nd century. BC e., as well as the reduction of the city choir of Dioscuria could be a direct consequence of the introduction of royal land ownership. This was due to the fact that under the Pontic rule, Colchis became the hereditary domain of the king of Pontus.

Another Greek city in the region, Gienos, was founded no later than the middle of the 6th century. BC e. Initially, the colonists lived there in semi-dugouts, however, during the VI-V centuries. BC e. the city was flourishing, and from the beginning of the IV century. BC e. - decline, obviously in connection with the development of Dioscuria and the growth of its choir. So it is unlikely that Gienos formed into a classic Hellenic polis.

The founding of colonies by the Miletians in the Eastern Black Sea region had its own specifics. There were only two large cities here - Phasis and Dioscuria, which developed into policies, while the latter, apparently, was ahead of Phasis in its importance, since it received a vast subject territory. The rest of the cities resembled the Sinop colonies in the Southern and Southeastern Black Sea coast, which did not always have a polis status, but were urban-type settlements subject to larger cities. It is possible that the small Greek cities in the east of the Black Sea region were also somewhat dependent on the Sinopeans, and this did not contribute to the development of polis relations. After the weakening of Sinop influence in the region, many of them simply became dependent on larger policies, in particular, Dioscuria.

The Ionian colonization practice in the Black Sea region had both its own characteristics and general patterns. The settlement of the banks of the Pontus Euxinus in a number of cases took place spontaneously through the creation of semi-agricultural oikos type settlements. In such settlements, especially in the Western and Northwestern Black Sea region, polis relations were formed towards the end of the 6th - beginning of the 5th centuries. BC e., as soon as the conditions for the development of the urban economy were outlined and the influx of new settlers increased. But this happened in the absence of a settled population or with the relatively peaceful introduction of Greek settlers into the local barbarian environment, where there were traditions of agriculture (Colchians, Getae, Thracians, Mariandines). In the process of the formation of polis relations, the local population seemed to be attracted to the city, settling in its nearest district, and then generally moving to the polis as soon as polis civil institutions were created there. This happened in the Lower Bug, Lower Dniester, Lower Danube, something similar took place in Thrace and Colchis, partly in Paphlagonia.

But in cases where the colony was withdrawn centrally, as a rule, there was a need to subjugate the local population, since the territory was under the control of local kings or tribal leaders. In this case, apoikias relatively quickly turned into policies and urban centers. So it was in Heraclea, Callatis, Panticapaeum, Dioscuria, Tauric Chersonese. Quickly becoming policies, they began to actively develop choras, subjugated smaller Greek settlements that required protection from barbarian attacks, as was the case in the Bosporus, or the patronage of a larger policy, as happened in the Southern Black Sea region, Colchis, Northwestern Crimea and Thrace . In the Cimmerian Bosporus, cities that entered into good neighborly relations with local tribes (Pantikapey, Nymphaeum, Phanagoria, Sindik) did not experience serious upheavals caused by the attack of the nomadic Scythians, and quickly gained influence as polis centers. And the settlements that were devastated by the barbarians in the middle of the VI century. BC e. (Myrmekius, Tiritaka, Kepy, Hermonassa, Patreus), weakened, the processes of development of polis relations in them slowed down, and soon some of them were forced to become dependent on Panticapaeum. The latter thus obtained favorable conditions for the development of his chora and polis relations, including at the expense of smaller and weaker neighbors. So at the turn of the VI-V centuries. BC e. prerequisites began to take shape for the transformation of Panticapaeum into the leading policy of the Northern Black Sea region - the metropolis of the cities of the Bosporus.

When Sinop was founded, the situation was more complicated: the Thessalian colonists conquered the Inzheburun peninsula, on which Sinop is located, from the Cappadocians, and then gave way to the Milesian apoikia of Habron, founded as a semi-agrarian settlement, traditional for the Milesians, completely defenseless against barbarian attacks. And only after its defeat by the Cimmerians and the arrival of new apoiks ca. 632 BC e. conditions were formed for the formation of a polis structure and a large-scale choir in Sinop. The same fate befell Amis, where the Milesians, not having time to firmly gain a foothold and create a polis organization, were forced to yield to the neighboring Cappadocians. And only with the arrival of settlers from Phocaea did this colony begin to develop first into a city, and then into a polis with its chorus. In Heraclea and Callatis, the Milesians were generally forced out by the Dorian colonists, and only after that the prerequisites for the development of policies were formed there.

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